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JAPAN 


AN  ATTEMPT  AT  INTERPRETATION 


BY 

LAFCADIO    HEARN 

Honorary  Member  of  the  Japan  Society,  London  ;  formerly  Lecturer  in  ike 

Imperial  University  of  Tokyo  (i8g6-i<)o^) ,  and  Fourteen 

Years  a  Resident  of  Japan 


"  Perhaps  all  very  marked  national 
characters  can  be  traced  back  to  a 
time  of  rigid  and  pervading  disci 
pline."  —  WALTER  BAGEHOT. 


Vtfe.for* 
THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

LONDON:  MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LTD. 
1920 

All  right*  rettrvt* 


COPYRIGHT,  1904, 
BY  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


) 


\! 


Xortoooti 

J.  8.  Cuihing  &  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Oft. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


Contents 


CHAPTER  PAGB 

I.  DIFFICULTIES     .........  i 

II.  STRANGENESS  AND  CHARM         ......  7 

III.  THE  ANCIENT  CULT  ........  25 

IV.  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  HOME  ......  39 

V.  THE  JAPANESE  FAMILY      .......  63 

VI.  THE  COMMUNAL  CULT       .......  91 

VII.  DEVELOPMENTS  OF  SHINTO        ......  119 

VIII.  WORSHIP  AND  PURIFICATION     ......  147 

IX.  THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD          ......  '73 

X.  THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM    .....  201 

XI.  THE  HIGHER  BUDDHISM    .......  227 

XII.  THE  SOCIAL  ORGANIZATION       ......  251 

XIII.  THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER        ....  283 

XIV.  THE  RELIGION  OF  LOYALTY      ......  309 

XV.  THE  JESUIT  PERIL     ........  331 

XVI.  FEUDAL  INTEGRATION        .......  373 

XVII.  THE  SHINTO  REVIVAL       .......  399 

XVIII.  SURVIVALS  ..........  415 

XIX.  MODERN  RESTRAINTS        .......  431 

XX.  OFFICIAL  EDUCATION         .......  457 

XXI.  INDUSTRIAL  DANGER         .......  483 

XXII.  REFLECTIONS      .....       .       •       .  499 

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTES  .........  527 

INDEX  .......                «...  529 


M199173 


Difficulties 


Difficulties 

A  THOUSAND  books  have  been  written 
about  Japan  ;  but  among  these,  —  setting 
aside  artistic  publications  and  works  of  a 
purely  special  character, — the  really  precious  vol 
umes  will  be  found  to  number  scarcely  a  score. 
This  fact  is  due  to  the  immense  difficulty  of  per 
ceiving  and  comprehending  what  underlies  the 
surface  of  Japanese  life.  No  work  fully  inter 
preting  that  life, — no  work  picturing  Japan  within 
and  without,  historically  and  socially,  psychologi 
cally  and  ethically,  —  can  be  written  for  at  least 
another  fifty  years.  So  vast  and  intricate  the 
subject  that  the  united  labour  of  a  generation  of 
scholars  could  not  exhaust  it,  and  so  difficult  that 
the  number  of  scholars  willing  to  devote  their 
time  to  it  must  always  be  small.  Even  among 
the  Japanese  themselves,  no  scientific  knowledge 
of  their  own  history  is  yet  possible  ;  because  the 
means  of  obtaining  that  knowledge  have  not  yet 
been  prepared,  —  though  mountains  of  material 
have  been  collected.  The  want  of  any  good  his 
tory  upon  a  modern  plan  is  but  one  of  many 
discouraging  wants.  Data  for  the  study  of  sociol- 

3 


4  DIFFICULTIES 

ogy  are  still  inaccessible  to  the  Western  investi 
gator.  The  early  state  of  the  family  and  the 
clan ;  the  history  of  the  differentiation  of  classes ; 
the  history  of  the  differentiation  of  political  from 
religious  law;  the  history  of  restraints,  and  of 
their  influence  upon  custom  ;  the  history  of  regu 
lative  and  cooperative  conditions  in  the  develop 
ment  of  industry ;  the  history  of  ethics  and 
aesthetics,  —  all  these  and  many  other  matters 
remain  obscure. 

This  essay  of  mine  can  serve  in  one  direction 
only  as  a  contribution  to  the  Western  knowledge 
of  Japan.  But  this  direction  is  not  one  of  the  least 
important.  Hitherto  the  subject  of  Japanese  re 
ligion  has  been  written  of  chiefly  by  the  sworn 
enemies  of  that  religion :  by  others  it  has  been 
almost  entirely  ignored.  Yet  while  it  continues  to 
be  ignored  and  misrepresented,  no  real  knowledge 
of  Japan  is  possible.  Any  true  comprehension  of 
social  conditions  requires  more  than  a  superficial 
acquaintance  with  religious  conditions.  Even  the 
industrial  history  of  a  people  cannot  be  understood 
without  some  knowledge  of  those  religious  tradi 
tions  and  customs  which  regulate  industrial  life 
during  the  earlier  stages  of  its  development.  .  .  . 
Or  take  the  subject  of  art.  Art  in  Japan  is  so 
intimately  associated  with  religion  that  any  attempt 
to  study  it  without  extensive  knowledge  of  the 


DIFFICULTIES  5 

beliefs  which  it  reflects,  were  mere  waste  of  time. 
By  art  I  do  not  mean  only  painting  and  sculpture, 
but  every  kind  of  decoration,  and  most  kinds  of 
pictorial    representation,  —  the    image    on    a    boy's 
kite  or  a  girl's  battledore,  not  less  than  the  design 
upon  a  lacquered  casket  or  enamelled  vase,  —  the 
figures  upon  a  workman's  towel  not  less  than  the 
pattern  of  the  girdle  of  a  princess,  —  the  shape  of 
the   paper-dog  or  the  wooden   rattle  bought  for  a 
baby,   not    less    than    the    forms   of  those  colossal 
Ni-O  who  guard   the   gateways  of  Buddhist  tem 
ples.  .  .  .     And    surely    there    can    never   be    any 
just  estimate  made  of  Japanese  literature,  until  a 
study  of  that  literature  shall  have  been  made  by 
some  scholar,  not  only  able  to  understand  Japanese 
beliefs,  but  able  also  to  sympathize  with  them  to 
at  least  the  same  extent  that  our  great  humanists 
can  sympathize  with  the  religion  of  Euripides,  of 
Pindar,  and  of  Theocritus.     Let  us  ask  ourselves 
how   much   of  English   or   French   or   German   or 
Italian  literature  could  be  fully  understood  without 
the  slightest  knowledge  of  the  ancient  and  modern 
religions  of  the  Occident.     I   do  not  refer  to  dis 
tinctly  religious  creators,  —  to  poets  like  Milton  or 
Dante,  —  but  only  to   the   fact  that  even    one   of 
Shakespeare's  plays  must  remain  incomprehensible 
to   a  person   knowing  nothing  either  of  Christian 
beliefs  or  of  the  beliefs  which  preceded  them.     The 
real  mastery  of  any  European  tongue  is  impossible 


6  DIFFICULTIES 

without  a  knowledge  of  European  religion.  The 
language  of  even  the  unlettered  is  full  of  religious 
meaning  :  the  proverbs  and  household-phrases  of 
the  poor,  the  songs  of  the  street,  the  speech  of  the 
workshop,  —  all  are  infused  with  significations  un 
imaginable  by  any  one  ignorant  of  the  faith  of  the 
people.  Nobody  knows  this  better  than  a  man 
who  has  passed  many  years  in  trying  to  teach  Eng 
lish  in  Japan,  to  pupils  whose  faith  is  utterly  unlike 
our  own,  and  whose  ethics  have  been  shaped  by  a 
totally  different  social  experience. 


Strangeness  and   Charm 


Strangeness  and   Charm 

THE  majority  of  the  first  impressions  of  Japan 
recorded  by   travellers    are    pleasurable   im 
pressions.      Indeed,   there    must    be    some 
thing   lacking,    or    something   very    harsh,    in    the 
nature    to    which   Japan    can    make    no    emotional 
appeal.     The  appeal  itself  is  the  clue  to  a  problem ; 
and  that  problem  is  the  character  of  a  race  and  of 
its  civilization. 

My  own  first  impressions  of  Japan,  —  Japan  as 
seen  in  the  white  sunshine  of  a  perfect  spring  day, 
—  had  doubtless  much  in  common  with  the  average 
of  such  experiences.  I  remember  especially  the  won 
der  and  the  delight  of  the  vision.  The  wonder  and 
the  delight  have  never  passed  away :  they  are  often 
revived  for  me  even  now,  by  some  chance  happen 
ing,  after  fourteen  years  of  sojourn.  But  the  reason 
of  these  feelings  was  difficult  to  learn,  —  or  at  least 
to  guess ;  for  I  cannot  yet  claim  to  know  much 
about  Japan.  .  .  .  Long  ago  the  best  and  dearest 
Japanese  friend  I  ever  had  said  to  me,  a  little  before 
his  death  :  "  When  you  find,  in  four  or  five  years 
more,  that  you  cannot  understand  the  Japanese  at 

9 


io  STRANGENESS    AND    CHARM 

all,  then  you  will  begin  to  know  something  about 
them."  After  having  realized  the  truth  of  my 
friend's  prediction,  —  after  having  discovered  that 
I  cannot  understand  the  Japanese  at  all, —  I  feel 
better  qualified  to  attempt  this  essay. 

As  first  perceived,  the  outward  strangeness  of 
things  in  Japan  produces  (in  certain  minds,  at  least) 
a  queer  thrill  impossible  to  describe,  —  a  feeling  of 
weirdness  which  comes  to  us  only  with  the  percep 
tion  of  the  totally  unfamiliar.  You  find  yourself 
moving  through  queer  small  streets  full  of  odd 
small  people,  wearing  robes  and  sandals  of  extraor 
dinary  shapes ;  and  you  can  scarcely  distinguish  the 
sexes  at  sight.  The  houses  are  constructed  and 
furnished  in  ways  alien  to  all  your  experience ;  and 
you  are  astonished  to  find  that  you  cannot  conceive 
the  use  or  meaning  of  numberless  things  on  display 
in  the  shops.  Food-stuffs  of  unimaginable  deriva 
tion  ;  utensils  of  enigmatic  forms  ;  emblems  incom 
prehensible  of  some  mysterious  belief;  strange 
masks  and  toys  that  commemorate  legends  of  gods 
or  demons  ;  odd  figures,  too,  of  the  gods  themselves, 
with  monstrous  ears  and  smiling  faces,  —  all  these 
you  may  perceive  as  you  wander  about ;  though  you 
must  also  notice  telegraph-poles  and  type-writers, 
electric  lamps  and  sewing  machines.  Everywhere 
on  signs  and  hangings,  and  on  the  backs  of  people 
passing  by,  you  will  observe  wonderful  Chinese 


STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM  n 

characters ;  and  the  wizardry  of  all  these  texts  makes 
the  dominant  tone  of  the  spectacle. 

Further  acquaintance  with  this  fantastic  world  will 
in  nowise  diminish  the  sense  of  strangeness  evoked 
by  the  first  vision  of  it.  You  will  soon  observe  that 
even  the  physical  actions  of  the  people  are  unfamiliar, 
—  that  their  work  is  done  in  ways  the  opposite  of 
Western  ways.  Tools  are  of  surprising  shapes,  and 
are  handled  after  surprising  methods :  the  black 
smith  squats  at  his  anvil,  wielding  a  hammer  such 
as  no  Western  smith  could  use  without  long  prac 
tice  ;  the  carpenter  pulls,  instead  of  pushing,  his 
extraordinary  plane  and  saw.  Always  the  left  is  the 
right  side,  and  the  right  side  the  wrong ;  and  keys 
must  be  turned,  to  open  or  close  a  lock,  in  what  we 
are  accustomed  to  think  the  wrong  direction.  Mr. 
Percival  Lowell  has  truthfully  observed  that  the 
Japanese  speak  backwards,  read  backwards,  write 
backwards,  —  and  that  this  is  "  only  the  abc  of  their 
contrariety."  For  the  habit  of  writing  backwards 
there  are  obvious  evolutional  reasons ;  and  the  re 
quirements  of  Japanese  calligraphy  sufficiently  explain 
why  the  artist  pushes  his  brush  or  pencil  instead  of 
pulling  it.  But  why,  instead  of  putting  the  thread 
through  the  eye  of  the  needle,  should  the  Japanese 
maiden  slip  the  eye  of  the  needle  over  the  point  of 
the  thread  ?  Perhaps  the  most  remarkable,  out  of  a 
hundred  possible  examples  of  antipodal  action,  is 
furnished  by  the  Japanese  art  of  fencing.  The 


12  STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM 

swordsman,  delivering  his  blow  with  both  hands, 
does  not  pull  the  blade  towards  him  in  the  moment 
of  striking,  but  pushes  it  from  him.  He  uses  it, 
indeed,  a?  other  Asiatics  do,  not  on  the  principle  of 
the  wedge,  but  of  the  saw  ;  yet  there  is  a  pushing'mo- 
tion  where  we  should  expect  a  pulling  motion  in  the 
stroke.  .  .  .  These  and  other  forms  of  unfamiliar 
action  are  strange  enough  to  suggest  the  notion  of  a 
humanity  even  physically  as  little  related  to  us  as 
might  be  the  population  of  another  planet,  —  the 
notion  of  some  anatomical  unlikeness.  No  such 
unlikeness,  however,  appears  to  exist ;  and  all  this 
oppositeness  probably  implies,  not  so  much  the  out 
come  of  a  human  experience  entirely  independent 
of  Aryan  experience,  as  the  outcome  of  an  experience 
evolutionally  younger  than  our  own. 

Yet  that  experience  has  been  one  of  no  mean 
order.  Its  manifestations  do  not  merely  startle : 
they  also  delight.  The  delicate  perfection  of  work 
manship,  the  light  strength  and  grace  of  objects,  the 
power  manifest  to  obtain  the  best  results  with  the 
least  material,  the  achieving  of  mechanical  ends  by 
the  simplest  possible  means,  the  comprehension  of 
irregularity  as  aesthetic  value,  the  shapeliness  and 
perfect  taste  of  everything,  the  sense  displayed  of 
harmony  in  tints  or  colours,  —  all  this  must  con 
vince  you  at  once  that  our  Occident  has  much  to 
learn  from  this  remote  civilization,  not  only  in 
matters  of  art  and  taste,  but  in  matters  likewise  of 


STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM  13 

economy  and  utility.  It  is  no  barbarian  fancy  that 
appeals  to  you  in  those  amazing  porcelains,  those 
astonishing  embroideries,  those  wonders  of  lacquer 
and  ivory  and  bronze,  which  educate  imagination  in 
unfamiliar  ways.  No  :  these  are  the  products  of  a 
civilization  which  became,  within  its  own  limits,  so 
exquisite  that  none  but  an  artist  is  capable  of  judg 
ing  its  manufactures,  —  a  civilization  that  can  be 
termed  imperfect  only  by  those  who  would  also  term 
imperfect  the  Greek  civilization  of  three  thousand 
years  ago. 

But  the  underlying  strangeness  of  this  world, — 
the  psychological  strangeness,  —  is  much  more  start 
ling  than  the  visible  and  superficial.  You  begin  to 
suspect  the  range  of  it  after  having  discovered  that 
no  adult  Occidental  can  perfectly  master  the  lan 
guage.  East  and  West  the  fundamental  parts  of 
human  nature  —  the  emotional  bases  of  it  —  are 
much  the  same  :  the  mental  difference  between 
a  Japanese  and  a  European  child  is  mainly  potential. 
But  with  growth  the  difference  rapidly  develops  and 
widens,  till  it  becomes,  in  adult  life,  inexpressible. 
The  whole  of  the  Japanese  mental  superstructure 
evolves  into  forms  having  nothing  in  common  with 
Western  psychological  development :  the  expression 
of  thought  becomes  regulated,  and  the  expression 
of  emotion  inhibited  in  ways  that  bewilder  and 
astound.  The  ideas  of  this  people  are  not  our 


i4  STRANGENESS    AND    CHARM 

ideas ;  their  sentiments  are  not  our  sentiments ; 
their  ethical  life  represents  for  us  regions  of  thought 
and  emotion  yet  unexplored,  or  perhaps  long  for 
gotten.  Any  one  of  their  ordinary  phrases,  trans 
lated  into  Western  speech,  makes  hopeless  nonsense  ; 
and  the  literal  rendering  into  Japanese  of  the  sim 
plest  English  sentence  would  scarcely  be  compre 
hended  by  any  Japanese  who  had  never  studied  a 
European  tongue.  Could  you  learn  all  the  words 
in  a  Japanese  dictionary,  your  acquisition  would  not 
help  you  in  the  least  to  make  yourself  understood 
in  speaking,  unless  you  had  learned  also  to  think 
like  a  Japanese,  —  that  is  to  say,  to  think  backwards, 
to  think  upside-down  and  inside-out,  to  think  in 
directions  totally  foreign  to  Aryan  habit.  Experi 
ence  in  the  acquisition  of  European  languages  can 
help  you  to  learn  Japanese  about  as  much  as  it 
could  help  you  to  acquire  the  language  spoken  by 
the  inhabitants  of  Mars.  To  be  able  to  use  the 
Japanese  tongue  as  a  Japanese  uses  it,  one  would 
need  to  be  born  again,  and  to  have  one's  mind  com 
pletely  reconstructed,  from  the  foundation  upwards. 
It  is  possible  that  a  person  of  European  parentage, 
born  in  Japan,  and  accustomed  from  infancy  to  use 
the  vernacular,  might  retain  in  after-life  that  instinc 
tive  knowledge  which  could  alone  enable  him  to 
adapt  his  mental  relations  to  the  relations  of  any 
Japanese  environment.  There  is  actually  an  Eng 
lishman  named  Black,  born  in  Japan,  whose  profi- 


STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM  15 

ciency  in  the  language  is  proved  by  the  fact  that  he 
is  able  to  earn  a  fair  income  as  a  professional  story 
teller  (hanashika).  But  this  is  an  extraordinary  case. 
.  .  .  As  for  the  literary  language,  I  need  only  ob 
serve  that  to  make  acquaintance  with  it  requires  very 
much  more  than  a  knowledge  of  several  thousand 
Chinese  characters.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  no  Occi 
dental  can  undertake  to  render  at  sight  any  literary 
text  laid  before  him  —  indeed  the  number  of  native 
scholars  able  to  do  so  is  very  small ;  —  and  although 
the  learning  displayed  in  this  direction  by  various 
Europeans  may  justly  compel  our  admiration,  the 
work  of  none  could  have  been  given  to  the  world 
without  Japanese  help. 

But  as  the  outward  strangeness  of  Japan  proves 
to  be  full  of  beauty,  so  the  inward  strangeness  ap 
pears  to  have  its  charm,  —  an  ethical  charm  reflected 
in  the  common  life  of  the  people.  The  attractive 
aspects  of  that  life  do  not  indeed  imply,  to  the 
ordinary  observer,  a  psychological  differentiation 
measurable  by  scores  of  centuries  :  only  a  scientific 
mind,  like  that  of  Mr.  Percival  Lowell,  immediately 
perceives  the  problem  presented.  The  less  gifted 
stranger,  if  naturally  sympathetic,  is  merely  pleased 
and  puzzled,  and  tries  to  explain,  by  his  own  ex 
perience  of  happy  life  on  the  other  side  of  the  world, 
the  social  conditions  that  charm  him.  Let  us  sup 
pose  that  he  has  the  good  fortune  of  being  able  to 


10  STRANGENESS    AND    CHARM 

live  for  six  months  or  a  year  in  some  old-fashioned 
town  of  the  interior.  From  the  beginning  of  this 
sojourn  he  can  scarcely  fail  to  be  impressed  by  the 
apparent  kindliness  and  joyousness  of  the  existence 
about  him.  In  the  relations  of  the  people  to  each 
other,  as  well  as  in  all  their  relations  to  himself, 
he  will  find  a  constant  amenity,  a  tact,  a  good-nature 
such  as  he  will  elsewhere  have  met  with  only  in  the 
friendship  of  exclusive  circles.  Everybody  greets 
everybody  with  happy  looks  and  pleasant  words ; 
faces  are  always  smiling;  the  commonest  incidents 
of  everyday  life  are  transfigured  by  a  courtesy  at 
once  so  artless  and  so  faultless  that  it  appears  to 
spring  directly  from  the  heart,  without  any  teaching. 
Under  all  circumstances  a  certain  outward  cheerful 
ness  never  fails  :  no  matter  what  troubles  may  come, 
—  storm  or  fire,  flood  or  earthquake,  —  the  laughter 
of  greeting  voices,  the  bright  smile  and  graceful 
bow,  the  kindly  inquiry  and  the  wish  to  please,  con 
tinue  to  make  existence  beautiful.  Religion  brings 
no  gloom  into  this  sunshine :  before  the  Buddhas 
and  the  gods  folk  smile  as  they  pray ;  the  temple- 
courts  are  playgrounds  for  the  children  ;  and  within 
the  enclosure  of  the  great  public  shrines  —  which 
are  places  of  festivity  rather  than  of  solemnity  — 
dancing-platforms  are  erected.  Family  existence 
would  seem  to  be  everywhere  characterized  by 
gentleness :  there  is  no  visible  quarrelling,  no  loud 
harshness,  no  tears  and  reproaches.  Cruelty,  even 


STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM  17 

to  animals,  appears  to  be  unknown :  one  sees  farmers, 
coming  to  town,  trudging  patiently  beside  their 
horses  or  oxen,  aiding  their  dumb  companions  to 
bear  the  burden,  and  using  no  whips  or  goads. 
Drivers  or  pullers  of  carts  will  turn  out  of  their  way, 
under  the  most  provoking  circumstances,  rather  than 
overrun  a  lazy  dog  or  a  stupid  chicken.  .  .  .  For 
no  inconsiderable  time  one  may  live  in  the  midst  of 
appearances  like  these,  and  perceive  nothing  to  spoil 
the  pleasure  of  the  experience. 

Of  course  the  conditions  of  which  I  speak  are 
now  passing  away  ;  but  they  are  still  to  be  found  in 
the  remoter  districts.  I  have  lived  in  districts 
where  no  case  of  theft  had  occurred  for  hundreds  of 
years,  —  where  the  newly-built  prisons  of  Meiji 
remained  empty  and  useless,  —  where  the  people 
left  their  doors  unfastened  by  night  as  well  as  by 
day.  These  facts  are  familiar  to  every  Japanese. 
In  such  a  district,  you  might  recognize  that  the 
kindness  shown  to  you,  as  a  stranger,  is  the  conse 
quence  of  official  command ;  but  how  explain  the 
goodness  of  the  people  to  each  other  ?  When  you 
discover  no  harshness,  no  rudeness,  no  dishonesty, 
no  breaking  of  laws,  and  learn  that  this  social  con 
dition  has  been  the  same  for  centuries,  you  are 
tempted  to  believe  that  you  have  entered  into  the 
domain  of  a  morally  superior  humanity.  All  this 
soft  urbanity,  impeccable  honesty,  ingenuous  kind 
liness  of  speech  and  act,  you  might  naturally  inter- 


i8  STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM 

pret  as  conduct  directed  by  perfect  goodness  of 
heart.  And  the  simplicity  that  delights  you  is  no 
simplicity  of  barbarism.  Here  every  one  has  been 
taught ;  every  one  knows  how  to  write  and  speak 
beautifully,  how  to  compose  poetry,  how  to  behave 
politely ;  there  is  everywhere  cleanliness  and  good 
taste ;  interiors  are  bright  and  pure ;  the  daily  use 
of  the  hot  bath  is  universal.  How  refuse  to  be 
charmed  by  a  civilization  in  which  every  relation 
appears  to  be  governed  by  altruism,  every  action 
directed  by  duty,  and  every  object  shaped  by  art  ? 
You  cannot  help  being  delighted  by  such  conditions, 
or  feeling  indignant  at  hearing  them  denounced  as 
"  heathen."  And  according  to  the  degree  of  altru 
ism  within  yourself,  these  good  folk  will  be  able, 
without  any  apparent  effort,  to  make  you  happy. 
The  mere  sensation  of  the  milieu  is  a  placid  happi 
ness  :  it  is  like  the  sensation  of  a  dream  in  which 
people  greet  us  exactly  as  we  like  to  be  greeted,  and 
say  to  us  all  that  we  like  to  hear,  and  do  for  us  all 
that  we  wish  to  have  done,  —  people  moving  sound 
lessly  through  spaces  of  perfect  repose,  all  bathed  in 
vapoury  iight.  Yes  —  for  no  little  time  these  fairy- 
folk  can  give  you  all  the  soft  bliss  of  sleep.  But 
sooner  or  later,  if  you  dwell  long  with  them,  your 
contentment  will  prove  to  have  much  in  common 
with  the  happiness  of  dreams.  You  will  never  for 
get  the  dream,  —  never ;  but  it  will  lift  at  last,  like 
those  vapours  of  spring  which  lend  preternatural 


STRANGENESS   AND   CHARM  19 

loveliness  to  a  Japanese  landscape  in  the  forenoon 
of  radiant  days.  Really  you  are  happy  because  you 
have  entered  bodily  into  Fairyland,  —  into  a  world 
that  is  not,  and  never  could  be  your  own.  You  have 
been  transported  out  of  your  own  century  —  over 
spaces  enormous  of  perished  time  —  into  an  era  for 
gotten,  into  a  vanished  age,  —  back  to  something  an 
cient  as  Egypt  or  Nineveh.  That  is  the  secret  of  the 
strangeness  and  beauty  of  things,  —  the  secret  of 
the  thrill  they  give,  —  the  secret  of  the  elfish  charm 
of  the  people  and  their  ways.  Fortunate  mortal ! 
the  tide  of  Time  has  turned  for  you  !  But  remem 
ber  that  here  all  is  enchantment,  —  that  you  have 
fallen  under  the  spell  of  the  dead,  —  that  the  lights 
and  the  colours  and  the  voices  must  fade  away  at 

last  into  emptiness  and  silence. 

*  *  *  #  * 

Some  of  us,  at  least,  have  often  wished  that  it 
were  possible  to  live  for  a  season  in  the  beautiful 
vanished  world  of  Greek  culture.  Inspired  by  our 
first  acquaintance  with  the  charm  of  Greek  art  and 
thought,  this  wish  comes  to  us  even  before  we  are 
capable  of  imagining  the  true  conditions  of  the  an 
tique  civilization.  If  the  wish  could  be  realized,  we 
should  certainly  find  it  impossible  to  accommodate 
ourselves  to  those  conditions,  —  not  so  much  be 
cause  of  the  difficulty  of  learning  the  environment, 
as  because  of  the  much  greater  difficulty  of  feeling 
just  as  people  used  to  feel  some  thirty  centuries 


20  STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM 

ago.  In  spite  of  all  that  has  been  done  for  Greek 
studies  since  the  Renaissance,  we  are  still  unable  to 
understand  many  aspects  of  the  old  Greek  life :  no 
modern  mind  can  really  feel,  for  example,  those 
sentiments  and  emotions  to  which  the  great  tragedy 
of  CEdipus  made  appeal.  Nevertheless  we  are  much 
in  advance  of  our  forefathers  of  the  eighteenth  cen 
tury,  as  regards  the  knowledge  of  Greek  civilization. 
In  the  time  of  the  French  revolution,  it  was  thought 
possible  to  reestablish  in  France  the  conditions  of  a 
Greek  republic,  and  to  educate  children  according 
to  the  system  of  Sparta.  To-day  we  are  well  aware 
that  no  mind  developed  by  modern  civilization 
could  find  happiness  under  any  of  those  socialistic 
despotisms  which  existed  in  all  the  cities  of  the  an 
cient  world  before  the  Roman  conquest.  We  could 
no  more  mingle  with  the  old  Greek  life,  if  it  were 
resurrected  for  us,  —  no  more  become  a  part  of  it, 
—  than  we  could  change  our  mental  identities.  But 
how  much  would  we  not  give  for  the  delight  of 
beholding  it,  —  for  the  joy  of  attending  one  festi 
val  in  Corinth,  or  of  witnessing  the  Pan-Hellenic 
games  ?  .  .  . 

And  yet,  to  witness  the  revival  of  some  per 
ished  Greek  civilization,  —  to  walk  about  the  very 
Crotona  of  Pythagoras,  —  to  wander  through  the 
Syracuse  of  Theocritus,  —  were  not  any  more  of 
a  privilege  than  is  the  opportunity  actually  afforded 
us  to  study  Japanese  life.  Indeed,  from  the  evolu- 


STRANGENESS   AND    CHARM  21 

tional  point  of  view,  it  were  less  of  a  privilege, — 
since  Japan  offers  us  the  living  spectacle  of  condi 
tions  older,  and  psychologically  much  farther  away 
from  us,  than  those  of  any  Greek  period  with  which 
art  and  literature  have  made  us  closely  acquainted. 

The  reader  scarcely  needs  to  be  reminded  that  a 
civilization  less  evolved  than  our  own,  and  intel 
lectually  remote  from  us,  is  not  on  that  account  to 
be  regarded  as  necessarily  inferior  in  all  respects. 
Hellenic  civilization  at  its  best  represented  an  early 
stage  of  sociological  evolution ;  yet  the  arts  which  it 
developed  still  furnish  our  supreme  and  unapproach 
able  ideals  of  beauty.  So,  too,  this  much  more  ar 
chaic  civilization  of  Old  Japan  attained  an  average 
of  aesthetic  and  moral  culture  well  worthy  of  our 
wonder  and  praise.  Only  a  shallow  mind  —  a  very 
shallow  mind  — will  pronounce  the  best  of  that  cul 
ture  inferior.  But  Japanese  civilization  is  peculiar 
to  a  degree  for  which  there  is  perhaps  no  Western 
parallel,  since  it  offers  us  the  spectacle  of  many  suc 
cessive  layers  of  alien  culture  superimposed  above 
the  simple  indigenous  basis,  and  forming  a  very 
bewilderment  of  complexity.  Most  of  this  alien 
culture  is  Chinese,  and  bears  but  an  indirect  relation 
to  the  real  subject  of  these  studies.  The  peculiar 
and  surprising  fact  is  that,  in  spite  of  all  superim- 
position,  the  original  character  of  the  people  and 
of  their  society  should  still  remain  recognizable. 


22  STRANGENESS   AND   CHARM 

The  wonder  of  Japan  is  not  to  be  sought  in  the 
countless  borrowings  with  which  she  has  clothed 
herself,  —  much  as  a  princess  of  the  olden  time 
would  don  twelve  ceremonial  robes,  of  divers  col 
ours  and  qualities,  folded  one  upon  the  other  so  as 
to  show  their  many-tinted  edges  at  throat  and 
sleeves  and  skirt;  —  no,  the  real  wonder  is  the 
Wearer.  For  the  interest  of  the  costume  is  much 
less  in  its  beauty  of  form  and  tint  than  in  its  signifi 
cance  as  idea,  —  as  representing  something  of  the 
mind  that  devised  or  adopted  it.  And  the  supreme 
interest  of  the  old  Japanese  civilization  lies  in  what 
it  expresses  of  the  race-character,  —  that  character 
which  yet  remains  essentially  unchanged  by  all  the 
changes  of  Meiji. 

"  Suggests "  were  perhaps  a  better  word  than 
"  expresses,"  for  this  race-character  is  rather  to  be 
divined  than  recognized.  Our  comprehension  of 
it  might  be  helped  by  some  definite  knowledge  of 
origins ;  but  such  knowledge  we  do  not  yet  possess. 
Ethnologists  are  agreed  that  the  Japanese  race  has 
been  formed  by  a  mingling  of  peoples,  and  that  the 
dominant  element  is  Mongolian ;  but  this  dominant 
element  is  represented  in  two  very  different  types, 
—  one  slender  and  almost  feminine  of  aspect;  the 
other,  squat  and  powerful.  Chinese  and  Korean 
elements  are  known  to  exist  in  the  populations  of 
certain  districts ;  and  there  appears  to  have  been 
a  large  infusion  of  Aino  blood.  Whether  there  be 


STRANGENESS    AND    CHARM  23 

any  Malay  or  Polynesian  element  also  has  not  been 
decided.  Thus  much  only  can  be  safely  affirmed, 
—  that  the  race,  like  all  good  races,  is  a  mixed  one ; 
and  that  the  peoples  who  originally  united  to  form 
it  have  been  so  blended  together  as  to  develop, 
under  long  social  discipline,  a  tolerably  uniform  type 
of  character.  This  character,  though  immediately 
recognizable  in  some  of  its  aspects,  presents  us  with 
many  enigmas  that  are  very  difficult  to  explain. 

Nevertheless,  to  understand  it  better  has  become 
a  matter  of  importance.  Japan  has  entered  into  the 
world's  competitive  struggle ;  and  the  worth  of  any 
people  in  that  struggle  depends  upon  character  quite 
as  much  as  upon  force.  We  can  learn  something 
about  Japanese  character  if  we  are  able  to  ascertain 
the  nature  of  the  conditions  which  shaped  it,  —  the 
great  general  facts  of  the  moral  experience  of  the 
race.  And  these  facts  we  should  find  expressed  or 
suggested  in  the  history  of  the  national  beliefs,  and 
in  the  history  of  those  social  institutions  derived 
from  and  developed  by  religion. 


The  Ancient  Cult 


The    Ancient    Cult 

THE  real  religion  of  Japan,  the  religion  still 
professed  in  one  form  or  other,  by  the  entire 
nation,  is  that  cult  which  has  been  the  foun 
dation  of  all  civilized  religion,  and  of  all  civilized 
society, — Ancestor-worship.  In  the  course  of  thou 
sands  of  years  this  original  cult  has  undergone  modi 
fications,  and  has  assumed  various  shapes ;  but 
everywhere  in  Japan  its  fundamental  character  re 
mains  unchanged.  Without  including  the  different 
Buddhist  forms  of  ancestor-worship,  we  find  three 
distinct  rites  of  purely  Japanese  origin,  subsequently 
modified  to  some  degree  by  Chinese  influence  and 
ceremonial.  These  Japanese  forms  of  the  cult  are 
all  classed  together  under  the  name  of  "  Shinto," 
which  signifies,  "  The  Way  of  the  Gods."  It  is 
not  an  ancient  term ;  and  it  was  first  adopted  only 
to  distinguish  the  native  religion,  or  cc  Way  "  from 
the  foreign  religion  of  Buddhism  called  "  Butsudo," 
or  "  The  Way  of  the  Buddha."  The  three  forms  of 
the  Shinto  worship  of  ancestors  are  the  Domestic 
Cult,  the  Communal  Cult,  and  the  State  Cult ;  — 
or,  in  other  words,  the  worship  of  family  an 
cestors,  the  worship  of  clan  or  tribal  ancestors, 

27 


28  THE   ANCIENT   CULT 

and  the  worship  of  imperial  ancestors.  The  first  is 
the  religion  of  the  home ;  the  second  is  the  religion 
of  the  local  divinity,  or  tutelar  god ;  the  third  is  the 
national  religion.  There  are  various  other  forms  of 
Shint5  worship ;  but  they  need  not  be  considered 
for  the  present. 

Of  the  three  forms  of  ancestor-worship  above 
mentioned,  the  family-cult  is  the  first  in  evolutional 
order,  —  the  others  being  later  developments.  But, 
in  speaking  of  the  family-cult  as  the  oldest,  I  do 
not  mean  the  home-religion  as  it  exists  to-day;  — 
neither  do  I  mean  by  "  family "  anything  corre 
sponding  to  the  term  "  household."  The  Japanese 
family  in  early  times  meant  very  much  more  than 
"  household ?> :  it  might  include  a  hundred  or  a 
thousand  households :  it  was  something  like  the 
Greek  ye/os  or  the  Roman  gens,  —  the  patriarchal 
family  in  the  largest  sense  of  the  term.  In  pre 
historic  Japan  the  domestic  cult  of  the  house- 
ancestor  probably  did  not  exist ;  —  the  family-rites 
would  appear  to  have  been  performed  only  at  the 
burial-place.  But  the  later  domestic  cult,  having 
been  developed  out  of  the  primal  family-rite,  in 
directly  represents  the  most  ancient  form  of  the 
religion,  and  should  therefore  be  considered  first  in 
any  study  of  Japanese  social  evolution. 

The  evolutional  history  of  ancestor- worship  has 
been  very  much  the  same  in  all  countries ;  and  that 


THE    ANCIENT   CULT  29 

of  the  Japanese  cult  offers  remarkable  evidence  in 
support  of  Herbert  Spencer's  exposition  of  the  law 
of  religious  development.  To  comprehend  this 
general  law,  we  must,  however,  go  back  to  the 
origin  of  religious  beliefs.  One  should  bear  in 
mind  that,  from  a  sociological  point  of  view,  it  is  no 
more  correct  to  speak  of  the  existing  ancestor-cult 
in  Japan  as  <c  primitive,"  than  it  would  be  to  speak 
of  the  domestic  cult  of  the  Athenians  in  the  time 
of  Pericles  as  "  primitive."  No  persistent  form  of 
ancestor-worship  is  primitive ;  and  every  established 
domestic  cult  has  been  developed  out  of  some  irregu 
lar  and  non-domestic  family-cult,  wSich,  again,  must 
have  grown  out  of  still  more  ancient  funeral-rites. 

Our  knowledge  of  ancestor-worship,  as  regards 
the  early  European  civilizations,  cannot  be  said  to 
extend  to  the  primitive  form  of  the  cult.  In  the 
case  of  the  Greeks  and  the  Romans,  our  knowledge 
of  the  subject  dates  from  a  period  at  which  a  domes 
tic  religion  had  long  been  established ;  and  we  have 
documentary  evidence  as  to  the  character  of  that 
religion.  But  of  the  earlier  cult  that  must  have 
preceded  the  home-worship,  we  have  little  testi 
mony  ;  and  we  can  surmise  its  nature  only  by  study 
of  the  natural  history  of  ancestor-worship  among 
peoples  not  yet  arrived  at  a  state  of  civilization. 
The  true  domestic  cult  begins  with  a  settled  civili 
zation.  Now  when  the  Japanese  race  first  estab 
lished  itself  in  Japan,  it  does  not  appear  to  have 


30  THE   ANCIENT   CULT 

brought  with  it  any  civilization  of  the  kind  which 
we  would  call  settled,  nor  any  well-developed  ances 
tor-cult.  The  cult  certainly  existed ;  but  its  ceremo 
nies  would  seem  to  have  been  irregularly  performed 
at  graves  only.  The  domestic  cult  proper  may  not 
have  been  established  until  about  the  eighth  cen 
tury,  when  the  spirit-tablet  is  supposed  to  have 
been  introduced  from  China.  The  earliest  ancestor- 
cult,  as  we  shall  presently  see,  was  developed  out 
of  the  primitive  funeral-rites  and  propitiatory  cere 
monies. 

The  existing  family  religion  is  therefore  a  com 
paratively  modern  development ;  but  it  is  at  least  as 
old  as  the  true  civilization  of  the  country,  and  it 
conserves  beliefs  and  ideas  which  are  indubitably 
primitive,  as  well  as  ideas  and  beliefs  derived  from 
these.  Before  treating  further  of  the  cult  itself,  it 
will  be  necessary  to  consider  some  of  these  older 
beliefs. 

The  earliest  ancestor-worship,  —  "the  root  of  all 
religions,"  as  Herbert  Spencer  calls  it,  —  was  prob 
ably  coeval  with  the  earliest  definite  belief  in  ghosts. 
As  soon  as  men  were  able  to  conceive  the  idea  of  a 
shadowy  inner  self,  or  double,  so  soon,  doubtless, 
the  propitiatory  cult  of  spirits  began.  But  this 
earliest  ghost-worship  must  have  long  preceded  that 
period  of  mental  development  in  which  men  first 
became  capable  of  forming  abstract  ideas.  The 


THE   ANCIENT   CULT  31 

primitive  ancestor-worshippers  could  not  have  formed 
the  notion  of  a  supreme  deity ;  and  all  evidence  ex 
isting  as  to  the  first  forms  of  their  worship  tends  to 
show  that  there  primarily  existed  no  difference  what 
ever  between  the  conception  of  ghosts  and  the  con 
ception  of  gods.  There  were,  consequently,  no 
definite  beliefs  in  any  future  state  of  reward  or  of 
punishment,  —  no  ideas  of  any  heaven  or  hell.  Even 
the  notion  of  a  shadowy  underworld,  or  Hades,  was 
of  much  later  evolution.  At  first  the  dead  were 
thought  of  only  as  dwelling  in  the  tombs  provided 
for  them,  —  whence  they  could  issue,  from  time  to 
time,  to  visit  their  former  habitations,  or  to  make 
apparition  in  the  dreams  of  the  living.  Their  real 
world  was  the  place  of  burial,  —  the  grave,  the  tumu 
lus.  Afterwards  there  slowly  developed  the  idea  of 
an  underworld,  connected  in  some  mysterious  way 
with  the  place  of  sepulture.  Only  at  a  much  later 
time  did  this  dim  underworld  of  imagination  expand 
and  divide  into  regions  of  ghostly  bliss  and  woe.  .  .  . 
It  is  a  noteworthy  fact  that  Japanese  mythology 
never  evolved  the  ideas  of  an  Elysium  or  a  Tartarus, 
—  never  developed  the  notion  of  a  heaven  or  a 
hell.  Even  to  this  day  Shinto  belief  represents  the 
pre-Homeric  stage  of  imagination  as  regards  the 
supernatural. 

Among  the  Indo-European  races  likewise  there 
appeared  to  have  been  at  first  no  difference  between 
gods  and  ghosts,  nor  any  ranking  of  gods  as  greater 


32  THE   ANCIENT   CULT 

and  lesser.  These  distinctions  were  gradually  devel 
oped.  "  The  spirits  of  the  dead,"  says  Mr.  Spencer, 
"  forming,  in  a  primitive  tribe,  an  ideal  group  the 
members  of  which  are  but  little  distinguished  from 
one  another,  will  grow  more  and  more  distinguished  ; 

—  and  as  societies  advance,  and  as  traditions,  local 
and  general,  accumulate  and  complicate,  these  once 
similar  human  souls,  acquiring  in  the  popular  mind 
differences  of  character  and  importance,  will  diverge 

—  until  their  original  community  of  nature  becomes 
scarcely  recognizable."     So  in  antique  Europe,  and 
so  in  the  Far  East,  were  the  greater  gods  of  nations 
evolved  from  ghost-cults;  but  those  ethics  of  ances 
tor-worship  which  shaped  alike  the  earliest  societies 
of  West  and  East,  date  from  a  period  before  the 
time  of  the  greater  gods,  —  from  the  period  when 
all  the  dead  were  supposed  to  become  gods,  with 
no  distinction  of  rank. 

No  more  than  the  primitive  ancestor-worshippers 
of  Aryan  race  did  the  early  Japanese  think  of  their 
dead  as  ascending  to  some  extra-mundane  region 
of  light  and  bliss,  or  as  descending  into  some  realm 
of  torment.  They  thought  of  their  dead  as  still 
inhabiting  this  world,  or  at  least  as  maintaining  with 
it  a  constant  communication.  Their  earliest  sacred 
records  do,  indeed,  make  mention  of  an  underworld, 
where  mysterious  Thunder-gods  and  evil  goblins 
dwelt  in  corruption  ;  but  this  vague  world  of  the 
dead  communicated  with  the  world  of  the  living ; 


THE   ANCIENT   CULT  33 

and  the  spirit  there,  though  in  some  sort  attached 
to  its  decaying  envelope,  could  still  receive  upon 
earth  the  homage  and  the  offerings  of  men.  Be 
fore  the  advent  of  Buddhism,  there  was  no  idea  of 
a  heaven  or  a  hell.  The  ghosts  of  the  departed 
were  thought  of  as  constant  presences,  needing  pro 
pitiation,  and  able  in  some  way  to  share  the  pleasures 
and  the  pains  of  the  living.  They  required  food 
and  drink  and  light ;  and  in  return  for  these,  they 
could  confer  benefits.  Their  bodies  had  melted 
into  earth  ;  but  their  spirit-power  still  lingered  in 
the  upper  world,  thrilled  its  substance,  moved  in 
its  winds  and  waters.  By  death  they  had  ac 
quired  mysterious  force  ;  —  they  had  become  "  su 
perior  ones,"  Kami,  gods. 

That  is  to  say,  gods  in  the  oldest  Greek  and 
Roman  sense.  Be  it  observed  that  there  were  no 
moral  distinctions,  East  or  West,  in  this  deification. 
"All  the  dead  become  gods,"  wrote  the  great 
Shinto  commentator,  Hirata.  So  likewise,  in  the 
thought  of  the  early  Greeks  and  even  of  the  later 
Romans,  all  the  dead  became  gods.  M.  de  Cou- 
langes  observes,  in  La  Cit'e  Antique :  —  "  This  kind 
of  apotheosis  was  not  the  privilege  of  the  great 
alone :  no  distinction  was  made.  ...  It  was  not 
even  necessary  to  have  been  a  virtuous  man :  the 
wicked  man  became  a  god  as  well  as  the  good 
man,  —  only  that  in  this  after-existence,  he  retained 
the  evil  inclinations  of  his  former  life."  Such  also 


34  THE   ANCIENT    CULT 

was  the  case  in  Shinto  belief:  the  good  man  be 
came  a  beneficent  divinity,  the  bad  man  an  evil 
deity,  —  but  all  alike  became  Kami.  "  And  since 
there  are  bad  as  well  as  good  gods,'*  wrote  Motowori, 
cc  it  is  necessary  to  propitiate  them  with  offerings 
of  agreeable  food,  playing  the  harp,  blowing  the 
flute,  singing  and  dancing  and  whatever  is  likely 
to  put  them  in  a  good  humour."  The  Latins 
called  the  maleficent  ghosts  of  the  dead,  Larvae, 
and  called  the  beneficent  or  harmless  ghosts,  Lares, 
or  Manes,  or  Genii,  according  to  Apuleius.  But 
all  alike  were  gods,  —  dii-manes ;  and  Cicero  ad 
monished  his  readers  to  render  to  all  dii-manes  the 
rightful  worship :  "  They  are  men,"  he  declared, 
cc  who  have  departed  from  this  life ;  —  consider 
them  divine  beings.  .  .  ." 

In  Shinto,  as  in  old  Greek  belief,  to  die  was  to 
enter  into  the  possession  of  superhuman  power, — • 
to  become  capable  of  conferring  benefit  or  of  inflict 
ing  misfortune  by  supernatural  means.  .  .  .  But 
yesterday,  such  or  such  a  man  was  a  common  toiler, 
a  person  of  no  importance;  —  to-day,  being  dead, 
he  becomes  a  divine  power,  and  his  children  pray 
to  him  for  the  prosperity  of  their  undertakings. 
Thus  also  we  find  the  personages  of  Greek  tragedy, 
such  as  Alcestis,  suddenly  transformed  into  divini 
ties  by  death,  and  addressed  in  the  language  of  wor 
ship  or  prayer.  But,  in  despite  of  their  supernatural 


THE   ANCIENT   CULT  35 

power,  the  dead  are  still  dependent  upon  the  living 
for  happiness.  Though  viewless,  save  in  dreams,  they 
need  earthly  nourishment  and  homage,  —  food  and 
drink,  and  the  reverence  of  their  descendants.  Each 
ghost  must  rely  for  such  comfort  upon  its  living  kin 
dred  ; —  only  through  the  devotion  of  that  kindred 
can  it  ever  find  repose.  Each  ghost  must  have  shel 
ter,  —  a  fitting  tomb  ;  —  each  must  have  offerings. 
While  honourably  sheltered  and  properly  nourished 
the  spirit  is  pleased,  and  will  aid  in  maintaining  the 
good-fortune  of  its  propitiators.  But  if  refused  the 
sepulchral  home,  the  funeral  rites,  the  offerings  of 
food  and  fire  and  drink,  the  spirit  will  suffer  from 
hunger  and  cold  and  thirst,  and,  becoming  angered, 
will  act  malevolently  and  contrive  misfortune  for 
those  by  whom  it  has  been  neglected.  .  .  .  Such 
were  the  ideas  of  the  old  Greeks  regarding  the  dead  ; 
and  such  were  the  ideas  of  the  old  Japanese. 

Although  the  religion  of  ghosts  was  once  the 
religion  of  our  own  forefathers  —  whether  of  North 
ern  or  Southern  Europe,  —  and  although  practices 
derived  from  it,  such  as  the  custom  of  decorating 
graves  with  flowers,  persist  to-day  among  our  most 
advanced  communities,  —  our  modes  of  thought 
have  so  changed  under  the  influences  of  modern 
civilization  that  it  is  difficult  for  us  to  imagine  how 
people  could  ever  have  supposed  that  the  happiness 
of  the  dead  depended  upon  material  food.  But  it 


36  THE   ANCIENT   CULT 

is  probable  that  the  real  belief  in  ancient  European 
societies  was  much  like  the  belief  as  it  exists  in  mod 
ern  Japan.  The  dead  are  not  supposed  to  consume 
the  substance  of  the  food,  but  only  to  absorb  the 
invisible  essence  of  it.  In  the  early  period  of  ances 
tor-worship  the  food-offerings  were  large ;  later  on 
they  were  made  smaller  and  smaller  as  the  idea  grew 
up  that  the  spirits  required  but  little  sustenance  of 
even  the  most  vapoury  kind.  But,  however  small 
the  offerings,  it  was  essential  that  they  should  be 
made  regularly.  Upon  these  shadowy  repasts  de 
pended  the  well-being  of  the  dead ;  and,  upon  the 
well-being  of  the  dead  depended  the  fortunes  of  the 
living.  Neither  could  dispense  with  the  help  of 
the  other :  the  visible  and  the  invisible  worlds  were 
forever  united  by  bonds  innumerable  of  mutual 
necessity ;  and  no  single  relation  of  that  union 
could  be  broken  without  the  direst  consequences. 

The  history  of  all  religious  sacrifices  can  be  traced 
back  to  this  ancient  custom  of  offerings  made  to 
ghosts;  and  the  whole  Indo-Aryan  race  had  at  one 
time  no  other  religion  than  this  religion  of  spirits. 
In  fact,  every  advanced  human  society  has,  at  some 
period  of  its  history,  passed  through  the  stage  of 
ancestor-worship ;  but  it  is  to  the  Far  East  that  we 
must  look  to-day  in  order  to  find  the  cult  coexisting 
with  an  elaborate  civilization.  Now  the  Japanese 
ancestor-cult  —  though  representing  the  beliefs  of  a 


THE   ANCIENT    CULT  37 

non-Aryan  people,  and  offering  in  the  history  of 
its  development  various  interesting  peculiarities  — 
still  embodies  much  that  is  characteristic  of  ancestor- 
worship  in  general.  There  survive  in  it  especially 
these  three  beliefs,  which  underlie  all  forms  of  per 
sistent  ancestor-worship  in  all  climes  and  countries: — 

I.  —  The  dead  remain  in  this  world,  —  haunting 
their  tombs,  and  also  their  former  homes,  and  shar 
ing  invisibly  in  the  life  of  their  living  descendants  ;  — 

II.  —  All  the  dead  become  gods,  in  the  sense  of 
acquiring  supernatural  power ;   but  they  retain  the 
characters  which  distinguished  them  during  life ;  — 

III.  —  The  happiness  of  the  dead  depends  upon 
the  respectful  service  rendered  them  by  the  living; 
and  the  happiness  of  the  living  depends  upon  the 
fulfilment  of  pious  duty  to  the  dead. 

To  these  very  early  beliefs  may  be  added  the  fol 
lowing,  probably  of  later  development,  which  at  one 
time  must  have  exercised  immense  influence :  — 

IV.  —  Every  event  in  the  world,  good  or  evil,  — 
fair  seasons  or  plentiful  harvests, — flood  and  famine, 
—  tempest  and  tidal-wave  and  earthquake,  —  is  the 
work  of  the  dead. 

V.  —  All  human  actions,  good  or  bad,  are  con 
trolled  by  the  dead. 

The  first  three  beliefs  survive  from  the  dawn  of 
civilization,  or  before  it,  —  from  the  time  in  which 


38  THE   ANCIENT   CULT 

the  dead  were  the  only  gods,  without  distinctions 
of  power.  The  latter  two  would  seem  rather  of  the 
period  in  which  a  true  mythology  —  an  enormous 
polytheism  —  had  been  developed  out  of  the  primi 
tive  ghost-worship.  There  is  nothing  simple  in 
these  beliefs :  they  are  awful,  tremendous  beliefs ; 
and  before  Buddhism  helped  to  dissipate  them,  their 
pressure  upon  the  mind  of  a  people  dwelling  in  a 
land  of  cataclysms,  must  have  been  like  an  endless 
weight  of  nightmare.  But  the  elder  beliefs,  in  soft 
ened  form,  are  yet  a  fundamental  part  of  the  exist 
ing  cult.  Though  Japanese  ancestor-worship  has 
undergone  many  modifications  in  the  past  two  thou 
sand  years,  these  modifications  have  not  transformed 
its  essential  character  in  relation  to  conduct ;  and  the 
whole  framework  of  society  rests  upon  it,  as  on  a 
moral  foundation.  The  history  of  Japan  is  really 
the  history  of  her  religion.  No  single  fact  in  this 
connection  is  more  significant  than  the  fact  that  the 
ancient  Japanese  term  for  government — matsuri-goto 
—  signifies  literally  "matters  of  worship."  Later 
on  we  shall  find  that  not  only  government,  but 
almost  everything  in  Japanese  society,  derives 
directly  or  indirectly  from  this  ancestor-cult ;  and 
that  in  all  matters  the  dead,  rather  than  the  living, 
have  been  the  rulers  of  t;*e  nation  and  the  shapers 
of  its  destinies. 


The   Religion   of  the   Home 


The   Religion   of  the   Home 

THREE  stages  of  ancestor- worship  are  to  be 
distinguished  in  the  general  course  of  reli 
gious  and  social  evolution ;  and  each  of 
these  finds  illustration  in  the  history  of  Japanese 
society.  The  first  stage  is  that  which  exists  before 
the  establishment  of  a  settled  civilization,  when 
there  is  yet  no  national  ruler,  and  when  the  unit 
of  society  is  the  great  patriarchal  family,  with  its 
elders  or  war-chiefs  for  lords.  Under  these  condi 
tions,  the  spirits  of  the  family-ancestors  only  are 
worshipped ;  —  each  family  propitiating  its  own 
dead,  and  recognizing  no  other  form  of  worship. 
As  the  patriarchal  families,  later  on,  become  grouped 
into  tribal  clans,  there  grows  up  the  custom  of 
tribal  sacrifice  to  the  spirits  of  the  clan-rulers;  — 
this  cult  being  superadded  to  the  family-cult, 
and  marking  the  second  stage  of  ancestor-worship. 
Finally,  with  the  union  of  all  the  clans  or  tribes  under 
one  supreme  head,  there  is  developed  the  custom 
of  propitiating  the  spirits  of  national  rulers.  This 
third  form  of  the  cult  becomes  the  obligatory  reli- 

41 


42         THE   RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME 

gion  of  the  country ;  but  it  does  not  replace  either 
of  the  preceding  cults :  the  three  continue  to  exist 
together. 

Though,  in  the  present  state  of  our  knowledge, 
the  evolution  in  Japan  of  these  three  stages  of 
ancestor-worship  is  but  faintly  traceable,  we  can 
divine  tolerably  well,  from  various  records,  how 
the  permanent  forms  of  the  cult  were  first  developed 
out  of  the  earlier  funeral-rites.  Between  the  ancient 
Japanese  funeral  customs  arid  those  of  antique 
Europe,  there  was  a  vast  difference,  —  a  difference 
indicating,  as  regards  Japan,  a  far  more  primitive 
social  condition.  In  Greece  and  in  Italy  it  was 
an  early  custom  to  bury  the  family  dead  within  the 
limits  of  the  family  estate ;  and  the  Greek  and 
Roman  laws  of  property  grew  out  of  this  practice. 
Sometimes  the  dead  were  buried  close  to  the  house. 
The  author  of  La  Cite  Antique  cites,  among  other 
ancient  texts  bearing  upon  the  subject,  an  interesting 
invocation  from  the  tragedy  of  He/en,  by  Euripi 
des  :  — "  All  hail !  my  father's  tomb  !  I  buried 
thee,  Proteus,  at  the  place  where  men  pass  out,  that 
I  might  often  greet  thee ;  and  so,  even  as  I  go  out 
and  in,  I,  thy  son  Theoclymenus,  call  upon  thee, 
father !  .  .  ."  But  in  ancient  Japan,  men  fled 
from  the  neighbourhood  of  death.  It  was  long 
the  custom  to  abandon,  either  temporarily,  or  per 
manently,  the  house  in  which  a  death  occurred ; 


THE   RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME         43 

and  we  can  scarcely  suppose  that,  at  any  time,  it 
was  thought  desirable  to  bury  the  dead  close 
to  the  habitation  of  the  surviving  members  of  the 
household.  Some  Japanese  authorities  declare  that 
in  the  very  earliest  ages  there  was  no  burial,  and 
that  corpses  were  merely  conveyed  to  desolate  places, 
and  there  abandoned  to  wild  creatures.  Be  this  as 
it  may,  we  have  documentary  evidence,  of  an  unmis 
takable  sort,  concerning  the  early  funeral-rites  as 
they  existed  when  the  custom  of  burying  had  be 
come  established,  —  rites  weird  and  strange,  and 
having  nothing  in  common  with  the  practices  of 
settled  civilization.  There  is  reason  to  believe  that 
the  family-dwelling  was  at  first  permanently,  not 
temporarily,  abandoned  to  the  dead ;  and  in  view 
of  the  fact  that  the  dwelling  was  a  wooden  hut  of 
very  simple  structure,  there  is  nothing  improbable 
in  the  supposition.  At  all  events  the  corpse  was 
left  for  a  certain  period,  called  the  period  of  mourn 
ing,  either  in  the  abandoned  house  where  the  death 
occurred,  or  in  a  shelter  especially  built  for  the 
purpose ;  and,  during  the  mourning  period,  offer 
ings  of  food  and  drink  were  set  before  the  dead, 
and  ceremonies  performed  without  the  house.  One 
of  these  ceremonies  consisted  in  the  recital  of  poems 
in  praise  of  the  dead,  —  which  poems  were  called 
shinobigoto.  There  was  music  also  of  flutes  and 
drums,  and  dancing ;  and  at  night  a  fire  was  kept 
burning  before  the  house.  After  all  this  had  been 


44         THE    RELIGION   OF   THE    HOME 

done  for  the  fixed  period  of  mourning  —  eight  days, 
according  to  some  authorities,  fourteen  according 
to  others  —  the  corpse  was  interred.  It  is  probable 
that  the  deserted  house  may  thereafter  have  become 
an  ancestral  temple,  or  ghost-house,  —  prototype  of 
the  Shinto  miya. 

At  an  early  time,  —  though  when  we  do  not 
know,  —  it  certainly  became  the  custom  to  erect  a 
moya,  or  cc  mourning-house "  in  the  event  of  a 
death ;  and  the  rites  were  performed  at  the  mourn 
ing-house  prior  to  the  interment.  The  manner  of 
burial  was  very  simple  :  there  were  yet  no  tombs  in 
the  literal  meaning  of  the  term,  and  no  tombstones. 
Only  a  mound  was  thrown  up  over  the  grave ;  and 
the  size  of  the  mound  varied  according  to  the  rank 
of  the  dead. 

The  custom  of  deserting  the  house  in  which  a 
death  took  place  would  accord  with  the  theory  of 
a  nomadic  ancestry  for  the  Japanese  people :  it  was 
a  practice  totally  incompatible  with  a  settled  civili 
zation  like  that  of  the  early  Greeks  and  Romans, 
whose  customs  in  regard  to  burial  presuppose  small 
landholdings  in  permanent  occupation.  But  there 
may  have  been,  even  in  early  times,  some  exceptions 
to  general  custom  —  exceptions  made  by  necessity. 
To-day,  in  various  parts  of  the  country,  and  perhaps 
more  particularly  in  districts  remote  from  temples, 
it  is  the  custom  for  farmers  to  bury  their  dead  upon 
their  own  lands. 


THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME         45 

—  At  regular  intervals  after  burial,  ceremonies 
were  performed  at  the  graves ;  and  food  and  drink 
were  then  served  to  the  spirits.  When  the  spirit- 
tablet  had  been  introduced  from  China,  and  a  true 
domestic  cult  established,  the  practice  of  making 
offerings  at  the  place  of  burial  was  not  discontin 
ued.  It  survives  to  the  present  time,  —  both  in  the 
Shinto  and  the  Buddhist  rite ;  and  every  spring  an 
Imperial  messenger  presents  at  the  tomb  of  the 
Emperor  Jimmu,  the  same  offerings  of  birds  and 
fish  and  seaweed,  rice  and  rice-wine,  which  were 
made  to  the  spirit  of  the  Founder  of  the  Empire 
twenty-five  hundred  years  ago.  But  before  the 
period  of  Chinese  influence  the  family  would  seem 
to  have  worshipped  its  dead  only  before  the  mortu 
ary  house,  or  at  the  grave ;  and  the  spirits  were  yet 
supposed  to  dwell  especially  in  their  tombs,  with 
access  to  some  mysterious  subterranean  world. 
They  were  supposed  to  need  other  things  besides 
nourishment ;  and  it  was  customary  to  place  in  the 
grave  various  articles  for  their  ghostly  use,  —  a 
sword,  for  example,  in  the  case  of  a  warrior;  a 
mirror  in  the  case  of  a  woman,  —  together  with 
certain  objects,  especially  prized  during  life,  —  such 
as  objects  of  precious  metal,  and  polished  stones  or 
gems.  .  .  .  At  this  stage  of  ancestor-worship,  when 
the  spirits  are  supposed  to  require  shadowy  service 
of  a  sort  corresponding  to  that  exacted  during  their 
life-time  in  the  body,  we  should  expect  to  hear  of 


46         THE   RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME 

human  sacrifices  as  well  as  of  animal  sacrifices.  At 
the  funerals  of  great  personages  such  sacrifices  were 
common.  Owing  to  beliefs  of  which  all  knowledge 
has  been  lost,  these  sacrifices  assumed  a  character 
much  more  cruel  than  that  of  the  immolations  of  the 
Greek  Homeric  epoch.  The  human  victims1  were 
buried  up  to  the  neck  in  a  circle  about  the  grave, 
and  thus  left  to  perish  under  the  beaks  of  birds  and 
the  teeth  of  wild  beasts.  The  term  applied  to  this 
form  of  immolation,  —  hitogaki,  or  "  human  hedge," 
—  implies  a  considerable  number  of  victims  in  each 
case.  This  custom  was  abolished,  by  the  Emperor 
Suinin,  about  nineteen  hundred  years  ago ;  and  the 
Nihongi  declares  that  it  was  then  an  ancient  custom. 
Being  grieved  by  the  crying  of  the  victims  interred 
in  the  funeral  mound  erected  over  the  grave  of  his 
brother,  Yamato-hiko-no-mikoto,  the  Emperor  is 
recorded  to  have  said :  "  It  is  a  very  painful  thing 
to  force  those  whom  one  has  loved  in  life  to  follow 
one  in  death.  Though  it  be  an  ancient  custom, 
why  follow  it,  if  it  is  bad  ?  From  this  time  forward 
take  counsel  to  put  a  stop  to  the  following  of  the 
dead."  Nomi-no-Sukune,  a  court-noble  —  now 
apotheosized  as  the  patron  of  wrestlers  —  then  sug 
gested  the  substitution  of  earthen  images  of  men  and 
horses  for  the  living  victims  ;  and  his  suggestion  was 
approved.  The  hitogaki  was  thus  abolished ;  but 
compulsory  as  well  as  voluntary  following  of  the 

1  How  the  horses  and  other  animals  were  sacrificed,  does  not  clearly  appear. 


THE   RELIGION   OF   THE    HOME         4; 

dead  certainly  continued  for  many  hundred  years 
after,  since  we  find  the  Emperor  Kotoku  issuing  an 
edict  on  the  subject  in  the  year  646  A.D.  : — 

"  When  a  man  dies,  there  have  been  cases  of  people 
sacrificing  themselves  by  strangulation,  or  of  strangling 
others  by  way  of  sacrifice,  or  of  compelling  the  dead  man's 
horse  to  be  sacrificed,  or  of  burying  valuables  in  the  grave 
in  honour  of  the  dead,  or  of  cutting  off  the  hair  and  stab 
bing  the  thighs  and  [in  that  condition]  pronouncing  a  eulogy 
on  the  dead.  Let  all  such  old  customs  be  entirely  discon 
tinued." —  Nibongl ;  Aston's  translation. 

As  regarded  compulsory  sacrifice  and  popular  cus 
tom,  this  edict  may  have  had  the  immediate  effect 
desired ;  but  voluntary  human  sacrifices  were  not 
definitively  suppressed.  With  the  rise  of  the  mili 
tary  power  there  gradually  came  into  existence  an 
other  custom  of  junshi,  or  following  one's  lord  in 
death,  —  suicide  by  the  sword.  It  is  said  to  have 
begun  about  1333,  when  the  last  of  the  Hojo  re 
gents,  Takatoki,  performed  suicide,  and  a  number 
of  his  retainers  took  their  own  lives  by  harakiri>  in 
order  to  follow  their  master.  It  may  be  doubted 
whether  this  incident  really  established  the  practice. 
But  by  the  sixteenth  century  junshi  had  certainly 
become  an  honoured  custom  among  the  samurai. 
Loyal  retainers  esteemed  it  a  duty  to  kill  themselves 
after  the  death  of  their  lord,  in  order  to  attend  upon 
him  during  his  ghostly  journey.  A  thousand  years 


48         THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME 

of  Buddhist  teaching  had  not  therefore  sufficed  to 
eradicate  all  primitive  notions  of  sacrificial  duty. 
The  practice  continued  into  the  time  of  the  Toku- 
gawa  shogunate,  when  lyeyasu  made  laws  to  check 
it.  These  laws  were  rigidly  applied,  —  the  entire 
family  of  the  suicide  being  held  responsible  for  a  case 
of  junshi :  yet  the  custom  cannot  be  said  to  have 
become  extinct  until  considerably  after  the  beginning 
of  the  era  of  Meiji.  Even  during  my  own  time 
there  have  been  survivals,  —  some  of  a  very  touch 
ing  kind :  suicides  performed  in  hope  of  being  able 
to  serve  or  aid  the  spirit  of  master  or  husband  or 
parent  in  the  invisible  world.  Perhaps  the  strangest 
case  was  that  of  a  boy  fourteen  years  old,  who  killed 
himself  in  order  to  wait  upon  the  spirit  of  a  child, 
his  master's  little  son. 

The  peculiar  character  of  the  early  human  sacri 
fices  at  graves,  the  character  of  the  funeral-rites,  the 
abandonment  of  the  house  in  which  death  had  oc 
curred, —  all  prove  that  the  early  ancestor-worship 
was  of  a  decidedly  primitive  kind.  This  is  suggested 
also  by  the  peculiar  Shinto  horror  of  death  as  pollu 
tion  :  even  at  this  day  to  attend  a  funeral,  —  unless 
the  funeral  be  conducted  after  the  Shint5  rite,  —  is 
religious  defilement.  The  ancient  legend  of  Izanagi's 
descent  to  the  nether  world,  in  search  of  his  lost 
spouse,  illustrates  the  terrible  beliefs  that  once  ex 
isted  as  to  goblin-powers  presiding  over  decay. 


THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME         49 

Between  the  horror  of  death  as  corruption,  and  the 
apotheosis  of  the  ghost,  there  is  nothing  incongru 
ous  :  we  must  understand  the  apotheosis  itself  as  a 
propitiation.  This  earliest  Way  of  the  Gods  was 
JL  religion  of  perpetual  fear.  Not  ordinary  homes 
only  were  deserted  after  a  death :  even  the  Emperors, 
during  many  centuries,  were  wont  to  change  their 
capital  after  the  death  of  a  predecessor.  But,  gradu 
ally,  out  of  the  primal  funeral-rites,  a  higher  cult 
was  evolved.  The  mourning-house,  or  moya,  be 
came  transformed  into  the  Shinto  temple,  which  still 
retains  the  shape  of  the  primitive  hut.  Then  under 
Chinese  influence,  the  ancestral  cult  became  estab 
lished  in  the  home ;  and  Buddhism  at  a  later  day 
maintained  this  domestic  cult.  By  degrees  the 
household  religion  became  a  religion  of  tenderness 
as  well  as  of  duty,  and  changed  and  softened  the 
thoughts  of  men  about  their  dead.  As  early  as  the 
eighth  century,  ancestor-worship  appears  to  have 
developed  the  three  principal  forms  under  which  it 
still  exists ;  and  thereafter  the  family-cult  began  to 
assume  a  character  which  offers  many  resemblances 
to  the  domestic  religion  of  the  old  European  civili 
zations. 

Let  us  now  glance  at  the  existing  forms  of  this 
domestic  cult,  —  the  universal  religion  of  Japan. 
In  every  home  there  is  a  shrine  devoted  to  it.  If 
the  family  profess  only  the  Shint5  belief,  this  shrine, 


50         THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME 

or  mitamaya  ]  ("  august-spirit-dwelling  "),  —  tin) 
model  of  a  Shinto  temple, —  is  placed  upon  a  shelf 
fixed  against  the  wall  of  some  inner  chamber,  at  a 
height  of  about  six  feet  from  the  floor.  Such  a  shelf 
is  called  Mitama-San-no-tana,  or  "  Shelf  of  the 
august  spirits."  In  the  shrine  are  placed  thin 
tablets  of  white  wood,  inscribed  with  the  names  of 
the  household  dead.  Such  tablets  are  called  by 
a  name  signifying  "  spirit-substitutes "  (mitama- 
shiro),  or  by  a  probably  older  name  signifying 
"  spirit-sticks."  ...  If  the  family  worships  its  an 
cestors  according  to  the  Buddhist  rite,  the  mortuary 
tablets  are  placed  in  the  Buddhist  household-shrine, 
or  Butsudan,  which  usually  occupies  the  upper  shelf 
of  an  alcove  in  one  of  the  inner  apartments.  Bud 
dhist  mortuary-tablets  (with  some  exceptions)  are 
called  thai,  —  a  term  signifying  "  soul-commemo 
ration."  They  are  lacquered  and  gilded,  usually 
having  a  carved  lotos-flower  as  pedestal ;  and  they 
do  not,  as  a  rule,  bear  the  real,  but  only  the  religious 
and  posthumous  name  of  the  dead. 

Now  it  is  important  to  observe  that,  in  either 
cult,  the  mortuary  tablet  actually  suggests  a  minia 
ture  tombstone  —  which  is  a  fact  of  some  evolutional 
interest,  though  the  evolution  itself  should  be  Chi 
nese  rather  than  Japanese.  The  plain  gravestones 
in  Shint5  cemeteries  resemble  in  form  the  simple 

1  It  is  more  popularly  termed  miya,  "  august  house,"  — a  name  given  also  to  the 
ordinary  Shinto  temples. 


THE    RELIGION    OF    THE    HOME         51 

wooden  ghost-sticks,  or  spirit-sticks ;  while  the 
Buddhist  monuments  in  the  old-fashioned  Buddhist 
graveyards  are  shaped  like  the  ihai,  of  which  the 
form  is  slightly  varied  to  indicate  sex  and  age,  which 
is  also  the  case  with  the  tombstone. 

The  number  of  mortuary  tablets  in  a  household 
shrine  does  not  generally  exceed  five  or  six,  —  only 
grandparents  and  parents  and  the  recently  dead  being 
thus  represented;  but  the  name  of  remoter  ances 
tors  are  inscribed  upon  scrolls,  which  are  kept  in 
the  But sudan  or  the  mitamaya. 

Whatever  be  the  family  rite,  prayers  are  repeated 
and  offerings  are  placed  before  the  ancestral  tablets 
every  day.  The  nature  of  the  offerings  and  the 
character  of  the  prayers  depend  upon  the  religion 
of  the  household ;  but  the  essential  duties  of  the 
cult  are  everywhere  the  same.  These  duties  are 
not  to  be  neglected  under  any  circumstances  :  their 
performance  in  these  times  is  usually  intrusted  to 
the  elders,  or  to  the  women  of  the  household.1 

1  Not,  however,  upon  any  public  occasion,  —  such  as  a  gathering  of  relatives  at 
the  home  for  a  religious  anniversary  :  at  such  times  the  rites  are  performed  by  the 
head  of  the  household. 

Speaking  of  the  ancient  custom  (once  prevalent  in  every  Japanese  household, 
and  still  observed  in  Shinto  homes)  of  making  offerings  to  the  deities  of  the  cooking 
range  and  of  food,  Sir  Ernest  Satow  observes  :  "  The  rites  in  honour  of  these  gods 
were  at  first  performed  by  the  head  of  the  household  5  but  in  after-times  the  duty 
came  to  be  delegated  to  the  women  of  the  family  ' '  (Ancient  Japanese  Rituals) . 
We  may  infer  that  in  regard  to  the  ancestral  rites  likewise,  the  same  transfer  of 
duties  occurred  at  an  early  time,  for  obvious  reasons  of  convenience.  When  the 
duty  devolves  upon  the  elders  of  the  family  —  grandfather  and  grandmother  —  it  is 
usually  the  grandmother  who  attends  to  the  offerings.  In  the  Greek  and  Roman 


52         THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME 

There  is  no  long  ceremony,  no  imperative  rule 
about  prayers,  nothing  solemn  :  the  food-offerings 
are  selected  out  of  the  family  cooking;  the  mur 
mured  or  whispered  invocations  are  short  and  few. 
But,  trifling  as  the  rites  may  seem,  their  perform 
ance  must  never  be  overlooked.  Not  to  make  the 
offerings  is  a  possibility  undreamed  of:  so  long  as 
the  family  exists  they  must  be  made. 

To  describe  the  details  of  the  domestic  rite  would 
require  much  space,  —  not  because  they  are  compli 
cated  in  themselves,  but  because  they  are  of  a  sort 
unfamiliar  to  Western  experience,  and  vary  accord 
ing  to  the  sect  of  the  family.  But  to  consider  the 
details  will  not  be  necessary :  the  important  matter 
is  to  consider  the  religion  and  its  beliefs  in  relation 
to  conduct  and  character.  It  should  be  recognized 
that  no  religion  is  more  sincere,  no  faith  more  touch 
ing  than  this  domestic  worship,  which  regards  the 
dead  as  continuing  to  form  a  part  of  the  household 
life,  and  needing  still  the  affection  and  the  respect 
of  their  children  and  kindred.  Originating  in  those 
dim  ages  when  fear  was  stronger  than  love,  —  when 
the  wish  to  please  the  ghosts  of  the  departed  must 
have  been  chiefly  inspired  by  dread  of  their  anger,  — 
the  cult  at  last  developed  into  a  religion  of  affection  ; 
and  this  it  yet  remains.  The  belief  that  the  dead 

household  the  performance  of  the  domestic  rites  appears  to  have  been  obligatory 
upon  the  head  of  the  household  ;  but  we  know  that  the  women  took  part  10 
them. 


THE   RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME         53 

need  affection,  that  to  neglect  them  is  a  cruelty,  that 
their  happiness  depends  upon  duty,  is  a  belief  that 
has  almost  cast  out  the  primitive  fear  of  their  dis 
pleasure.  They  are  not  thought  of  as  dead :  they 
are  believed  to  remain  among  those  who  loved  them. 
Unseen  they  guard  the  home,  and  watch  over  the 
welfare  of  its  inmates :  they  hover  nightly  in  the 
glow  of  the  shrine-lamp ;  and  the  stirring  of  its 
flame  is  the  motion  of  them.  They  dwell  mostly 
within  their  lettered  tablets ;  —  sometimes  they  can 
animate  a  tablet,  —  change  it  into  the  substance  of  a 
human  body,  and  return  in  that  body  to  active  life, 
in  order  to  succour  and  console.  From  their  shrine 
they  observe  and  hear  what  happens  in  the  house ; 
they  share  the  family  joys  and  sorrows  ;  they  delight 
in  the  voices  and  the  warmth  of  the  life  about  them. 
They  want  affection  ;  but  the  morning  and  the  even 
ing  greetings  of  the  family  are  enough  to  make  them 
happy.  They  require  nourishment ;  but  the  vapour 
of  food  contents  them.  They  are  exacting  only  as 
regards  the  daily  fulfilment  of  duty.  They  were 
the  givers  of  life,  the  givers  of  wealth,  the  makers 
and  teachers  of  the  present :  they  represent  the  past 
of  the  race,  and  all  its  sacrifices  ;  —  whatever  the  liv 
ing  possess  is  from  them.  Yet  how  little  do  they 
require  in  return  !  Scarcely  more  than  to  be  thanked, 
as  the  founders  and  guardians  of  the  home,  in  sim 
ple  words  like  these  :  "  For  aid  received,  by  day  and 
by  nighty  accept,  August  Ones,  our  reverential  graft- 


54         THE   RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME 

tude"  .  .  .  To  forget  or  neglect  them,  to  treat  them 
with  rude  indifference,  is  the  proof  of  an  evil  heart ; 
to  cause  them  shame  by  ill-conduct,  to  disgrace  their 
name  by  bad  actions,  is  the  supreme  crime.  They 
represent  the  moral  experience  of  the  race :  whoso 
ever  denies  that  experience  denies  them  also,  and 
falls  to  the  level  of  the  beast,  or  below  it.  They 
represent  the  unwritten  law,  the  traditions  of  the 
commune,  the  duties  of  all  to  all :  whosoever  offends 
against  these,  sins  against  the  dead.  And,  finally, 
they  represent  the  mystery  of  the  invisible :  to 
Shinto  belief,  at  least,  they  are  gods. 

It  is  to  be  remembered,  of  course,  that  the  Japan 
ese  word  for  gods,  Kami,  does  not  imply,  any  more 
than  did  the  old  Latin  term,  dn-manesy  ideas  like 
those  which  have  become  associated  with  the  modern 
notion  of  divinity.  The  Japanese  term  might  be 
more  closely  rendered  by  some  such  expression  as 
"  the  Superiors,"  "  the  Higher  Ones  "  ;  and  it  was 
formerly  applied  to  living  rulers  as  well  as  to  deities 
and  ghosts.  But  it  implies  considerably  more  than 
the  idea  of  a  disembodied  spirit ;  for,  according  to 
old  Shinto  teaching  the  dead  became  world-rulers. 
They  were  the  cause  of  all  natural  events,  —  of 
winds,  rains,  and  tides,  of  buddings  and  ripenings, 
of  growth  and  decay,  of  everything  desirable  or 
dreadful.  They  formed  a  kind  of  subtler  element, 
—  an  ancestral  aether,  —  universally  extending  and 


THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME         55 

unceasingly  operating.  Their  powers,  when  united 
for  any  purpose,  were  resistless ;  and  in  time  of 
national  peril  they  were  invoked  en  masse  for  aid 
against  the  foe.  .  .  .  Thus,  to  the  eyes  of  faith, 
behind  each  family  ghost  there  extended  the  meas 
ureless  shadowy  power  of  countless  Kami ;  and  the 
sense  of  duty  to  the  ancestor  was  deepened  by  dim 
awe  of  the  forces  controlling  the  world,  —  the  whole 
invisible  Vast.  To  primitive  Shinto  conception  the 
universe  was  filled  with  ghosts ;  —  to  later  Shinto 
conception  the  ghostly  condition  was  not  limited  by 
place  or  time,  even  in  the  case  of  individual  spirits. 
"  Although/'  wrote  Hirata,  "  the  home  of  the  spirits 
is  in  the  Spirit-house,  they  are  equally  present 
wherever  they  are  worshipped,  —  being  gods,  and 
therefore  ubiquitous." 

The  Buddhist  dead  are  not  called  gods,  but  Bud- 
dhas  (Hotoke\  —  which  term,  of  course,  expresses  a 
pious  hope,  rather  than  a  faith.  The  belief  is  that 
they  are  only  on  their  way  to  some  higher  state  of 
existence ;  and  they  should  not  be  invoked  or  wor 
shipped  after  the  manner  of  the  Shint5  gods:  prayers 
should  be  said  for  them,  not,  as  a  rule,  to  them.1 
But  the  vast  majority  of  Japanese  Buddhists  are 
also  followers  of  Shinto ;  and  the  two  faiths,  though 
seemingly  incongruous,  have  long  been  reconciled 
in  the  popular  mind.  The  Buddhist  doctrine  has 

1  Certain  Buddhist  rituals  prove  exceptions  to  this  teaching. 


56         THE    RELIGION    OF    THE    HOME 

therefore  modified  the  ideas  attaching  to  the  cult 
much  less  deeply  than  might  be  supposed. 

In  all  patriarchal  societies  with  a  settled  civiliza 
tion,  there  is  evolved,  out  of  the  worship  of  ances 
tors,  a  Religion  of  Filial  Piety.  Filial  piety  still 
remains  the  supreme  virtue  among  civilized  peoples 
possessing  an  ancestor-cult.  .  .  .  By  filial  piety 
must  not  be  understood,  however,  what  is  commonly 
signified  by  the  English  term,  —  the  devotion  of 
children  to  parents.  We  must  understand  the  word 
"piety"  rather  in  its  classic  meaning,  as  the  fie  fas  of 
the  early  Romans,  —  that  is  to  say,  as  the  religious 
sense  of  household  duty.  Reverence  for  the  dead, 
as  well  as  the  sentiment  of  duty  towards  the  living ; 
the  affection  of  children  to  parents,  and  the  affection 
of  parents  to  children  ;  the  mutual  duties  of  husband 
and  wife ;  the  duties  likewise  of  sons-in-law  and 
daughters-in-law  to  the  family  as  a  body ;  the  duties 
of  servant  to  master,  and  of  master  to  dependent, 
—  all  these  were  included  under  the  term.  The 
family  itself  was  a  religion ;  the  ancestral  home  a 
temple.  And  so  we  find  the  family  and  the  home 
to  be  in  Japan,  even  at  the  present  day.  Filial 
piety  in  Japan  does  not  mean  only  the  duty  of 
children  to  parents  and  grandparents :  it  means  still 
more,  the  cult  of  the  ancestors,  reverential  service 
to  the  dead,  the  gratitude  of  the  present  to  the 
past,  and  the  conduct  of  the  individual  in  relation 


THE    RELIGION   OF   THE    HOME         57 

to  the  entire  household.  Hirata  therefore  declared 
that  all  virtues  derived  from  the  worship  of  ances 
tors  ;  and  his  words,  as  translated  by  Sir  Ernest 
Satow,  deserve  particular  attention  :  — 

"  It  is  the  duty  of  a  subject  to  be  diligent  in  wor 
shipping  his  ancestors,  whose  minister  he  should  consider 
himself  to  be.  The  custom  of  adoption  arose  from  the 
natural  desire  of  having  some  one  to  perform  sacrifices ; 
and  this  desire  ought  not  to  be  rendered  of  no  avail  by  neg 
lect.  Devotion  to  the  memory  of  ancestors  is  the  main 
spring  of  all  virtues.  No  one  who  discharges  his  duty  to 
them  will  ever  be  disrespectful  to  the  gods  or  to  his  living 
parents.  Such  a  man  also  will  be  faithful  to  his  prince, 
loyal  to  his  friends,  and  kind  and  gentle  to  his  wife  and 
children.  For  the  essence  of  this  devotion  is  indeed  filial 
piety." 

From  the  sociologist's  point  of  view,  Hirata  is 
right :  it  is  unquestionably  true  that  the  whole  sys 
tem  of  Far-Eastern  ethics  derives  from  the  religion 
of  the  household.  By  aid  of  that  cult  have  been 
evolved  all  ideas  of  duty  to  the  living  as  well  as  to 
the  dead, — the  sentiment  of  reverence,  the  sentiment 
of  loyalty,  the  spirit  of  self-sacrifice,  and  the  spirit 
of  patriotism.  What  filial  piety  signifies  as  a  re 
ligious  force  can  best  be  imagined  from  the  fact  that 
you  can  buy  life  in  the  East  —  that  it  has  its  price 
in  the  market.  This  religion  is  the  religion  of  China, 
and  of  countries  adjacent ;  and  life  is  for  sale  in 
China.  It  was  the  filial  piety  of  China  that  rendered 


58         THE    RELIGION   OF   THE   HOME 

possible  the  completion  of  the  Panama  railroad, 
where  to  strike  the  soil  was  to  liberate  death, — 
where  the  land  devoured  labourers  by  the  thousand, 
until  white  and  black  labour  could  no  more  be  pro 
cured  in  quantity  sufficient  for  the  work.  But  labour 
could  be  obtained  from  China  —  any  amount  of 
labour —  at  the  cost  of  life  ;  and  the  cost  was  paid  ; 
and  multitudes  of  men  came  from  the  East  to  toil 
and  die,  in  order  that  the  price  of  their  lives  might 
be  sent  to  their  families.  ...  I  have  no  doubt 
that,  were  the  sacrifice  imperatively  demanded,  life 
could  be  as  readily  bought  in  Japan,  —  though  not, 
perhaps,  so  cheaply.  Where  this  religion  prevails, 
the  individual  is  ready  to  give  his  life,  in  a  majority 
of  cases,  for  the  family,  the  home,  the  ancestors. 
And  the  filial  piety  impelling  such  sacrifice  becomes, 
by  extension,  the  loyalty  that  will  sacrifice  even  the 
family  itself  for  the  sake  of  the  lord,  —  or,  by  yet 
further  extension,  the  loyalty  that  prays,  like  Kusu- 
noki  Masashige,  for  seven  successive  lives  to  lay 
down  on  behalf  of  the  sovereign.  Out  of  filial  piety 
indeed  has  been  developed  the  whole  moral  power 
that  protects  the  state, — the  power  also  that  has 
seldom  failed  to  impose  the  rightful  restraints  upon 
official  despotism  whenever  that  despotism  grew 

dangerous  to  the  common  weal. 

• 

Probably  the  filial  piety  that   centred  about  the 
domestic  altars  of  the  ancient  West  differed  in  little 


THE   RELIGION   OF   THE   HOME         59 

from  that  which  yet  rules  the  most  eastern  East. 
But  we  miss  in  Japan  the  Aryan  hearth,  the  family 
altar  with  its  perpetual  fire.  The  Japanese  home- 
religion  represents,  apparently,  a  much  earlier  stage 
of  the  cult  than  that  which  existed  within  historic 
time  among  the  Greeks  and  Romans.  The  home 
stead  in  Old  Japan  was  not  a  stable  institution  like 
tne  Greek  or  the  Roman  home ;  the  custom  of 
burying  the  family  dead  upon  the  family  estate 
never  became  general ;  the  dwelling  itself  never 
assumed  a  substantial  and  lasting  character.  It  could 
not  be  literally  said  of  the  Japanese  warrior,  as  of 
the  Roman,  that  he  fought  pro  aris  et  focis.  There 
was  neither  altar  nor  sacred  fire :  the  place  of  these 
was  taken  by  the  spirit-shelf  or  shrine,  with  its  tiny 
lamp,  kindled  afresh  each  evening;  and,  in  early 
times,  there  were  no  Japanese  images  of  divinities. 
For  Lares  and  Penates  there  were  only  the  mortu 
ary-tablets  of  the  ancestors,  and  certain  little  tablets 
bearing  names  of  other  gods  —  tutelar  gods.  .  .  . 
The  presence  of  these  frail  wooden  objects  still 
makes  the  home  ;  and  they  may  be,  of  course,  trans 
ported  anywhere. 

To  apprehend  the  full  meaning  of  ancestor-wor 
ship  as  a  family  religion,  a  living  faith,  is  now  diffi 
cult  for  the  Western  mind.  *  We  are  able  to  imagine 
only  in  the  vaguest  way  how  our  Aryan  forefathers 
felt  and  thought  about  their  dead.  But  in  the 


60         THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME 

living  beliefs  of  Japan  we  find  much  to  suggest 
the  nature  of  the  old  Greek  piety.  Each  mem 
ber  of  the  family  supposes  himself,  or  herself, 
under  perpetual  ghostly  surveillance.  Spirit-eyes 
are  watching  every  act  ;  spirit-ears  are  listening 
to  every  word.  Thoughts  too,  not  less  than 
deeds,  are  visible  to  the  gaze  of  the  dead :  the 
heart  must  be  pure,  the  mind  must  be  under 
control,  within  the  presence  of  the  spirits.  Prob 
ably  the  influence  of  such  beliefs,  uninterruptedly 
exerted  upon  conduct  during  thousands  of  years, 
did  much  to  form  the  charming  side  of  Japanese 
character.  Yet  there  is  nothing  stern  or  solemn 
in  this  home-religion  to-day, —  nothing  of  that  rigid 
and  unvarying  discipline  supposed  by  Fustel  de 
Coulanges  to  have  especially  characterized  the 
Roman  cult.  It  is  a  religion  rather  of  gratitude 
and  tenderness ;  the  dead  being  served  by  the 
household  as  if  they  were  actually  present  in  the 
body.  ...  I  fancy  that  if  we  were  able  to  enter 
for  a  moment  into  the  vanished  life  of  some  old 
Greek  city,  we  should  find  the  domestic  religion 
there  not  less  cheerful  than  the  Japanese  home-cult 
remains  to-day.  I  imagine  that  Greek  children, 
three  thousand  years  ago,  must  have  watched,  like 
the  Japanese  children  of  to-day,  for  a  chance  to  steal 
some  of  the  good  things  offered  to  the  ghosts  of  the 
ancestors ;  and  I  fancy  that  Greek  parents  must 
have  chidden  quite  as  gently  as  Japanese  parents 


THE    RELIGION    OF   THE    HOME         61 

chide  in  this  era  of  Meiji,  —  mingling  reproof  with 
instruction,  and  hinting  of  weird  possibilities.1 

1  Food  presented  to  the  dead  may  afterwards  be  eaten  by  the  elders  of  the  house 
hold,  or  given  to  pilgrims  j  but  it  is  said  that  if  children  eat  of  it,  they  will  grow  up 
with  feeble  memories,  and  incapable  of  becoming  scholars. 


The  Japanese   Family 


The  Japanese   Family 

THE  great  general  idea,  the  fundamental  idea, 
underlying  every  persistent  ancestor-worship, 

is  that  the  welfare  of  the  living  depends 
upon  the  welfare  of  the  dead.  Under  the  influence 
of  this  idea,  and  of  the  cult  based  upon  it,  were 
developed  the  early  organization  of  the  family,  the 
laws  regarding  property  and  succession,  the  whole 
structure,  in  short,  of  ancient  society,  —  whether  in 
the  Western  or  the  Eastern  world. 

But  before  considering  how  the  social  structure 
in  old  Japan  was  shaped  by  the  ancestral  cult,  let 
me  again  remind  the  reader  that  there  were  at  first 
no  other  gods  than  the  dead.  Even  when  Japanese 
ancestor-worship  evolved  a  mythology,  its  gods 
were  only  transfigured  ghosts,  —  and  this  is  the 
history  of  all  mythology.  The  ideas  of  heaven 
and  hell  did  not  exist  among  the  primitive  Japanese, 
nor  any  notion  of  metempsychosis.  The  Buddhist 
doctrine  of  rebirth  —  a  late  borrowing  —  was  totally 
inconsistent  with  the  archaic  Japanese  beliefs,  and 
required  an  elaborate  metaphysical  system  to  sup 
port  it.  But  we  may  suppose  the  early  ideas  of 
the  Japanese  about  the  dead  to  have  been  much 

F  65 


66  THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY 

like  those  of  the  Greeks  of  the  pre-Homeric  era. 
There  was  an  underground  world  to  which  spirits 
descended  ;  but  they  were  supposed  to  haunt  by 
preference  their  own  graves,  or  their  "ghost-houses." 
Only  by  slow  degrees  did  the  notion  of  their  power 
of  ubiquity  become  evolved.  But  even  then  they 
were  thought  to  be  particularly  attached  to  their 
tombs,  shrines,  and  homesteads.  Hirata  wrote, 
in  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century :  "  The 
spirits  of  the  dead  continue  to  exist  in  the  unseen 
world  which  is  everywhere  about  us ;  and  they  all 
become  gods  of  varying  character  and  degrees  of 
influence.  Some  reside  in  temples  built  in  their 
honour ;  others  hover  near  their  tombs ;  and  they 
continue  to  render  service  to  their  prince,  parents, 
wives,  and  children,  as  when  in  the  body."  Evi 
dently  "  the  unseen  world "  was  thought  to  be  in 
some  sort  a  duplicate  of  the  visible  world,  and  de 
pendent  upon  the  help  of  the  living  for  its  prosperity. 
The  dead  and  the  living  were  mutually  dependent. 
The  all-important  necessity  for  the  ghost  was  sacri 
ficial  worship ;  the  all-important  necessity  for  the 
man  was  to  provide  for  the  future  cult  of  his  own 
spirit ;  and  to  die  without  assurance  of  a  cult  was 
the  supreme  calamity.  .  .  .  Remembering  these 
facts  we  can  understand  better  the  organization  of 
the  patriarchal  family,  —  shaped  to  maintain  and 
to  provide  for  the  cult  of  its  dead,  any  neglect  of 
which  cult  was  believed  to  involve  misfortune. 


THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY  67 

The  reader  is  doubtless  aware  that  in  the  old 
Aryan  family  the  bond  of  union  was  not  the  bond 
of  affection,  but  a  bond  of  religion,  to  which  natural 
affection  was  altogether  subordinate.  This  condi 
tion  characterizes  the  patriarchal  family  wherever 
ancestor-worship  exists.  Now  the  Japanese  family, 
like  the  ancient  Greek  or  Roman  family,  was  a  reli 
gious  society  in  the  strictest  sense  of  the  term ;  and 
a  religious  society  it  yet  remains.  Its  organization 
was  primarily  shaped  in  accordance  with  the  require 
ments  of  ancestor-worship  ;  its  later  imported  doc 
trines  of  filial  piety  had  been  already  developed  in 
China  to  meet  the  needs  of  an  older  and  similar 
religion.  We  might  expect  to  find  in  the  structure, 
the  laws,  and  the  customs  of  the  Japanese  family 
many  points  of  likeness  to  the  structure  and  the 
traditional  laws  of  the  old  Aryan  household, — 
because  the  law  of  sociological  evolution  admits  of 
only  minor  exceptions.  And  many  such  points  of 
likeness  are  obvious.  The  materials  for  a  serious 
comparative  study  have  not  yet  been  collected  :  very 
much  remains  to  be  learned  regarding  the  past  his 
tory  of  the  Japanese  family.  But,  along  certain 
general  lines,  the  resemblances  between  domestic 
institutions  in  ancient  Europe  and  domestic  institu 
tions  in  the  Far  East  can  be  clearly  established. 

Alike  in  the  early  European  and  in  the  old  Jap 
anese  civilization  it  was  believed  that  the  prosperity 


68  THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY 

of  the  family  depended  upon  the  exact  fulfilment 
of  the  duties  of  the  ancestral  cult;  and,  to  a  consid 
erable  degree,  this  belief  rules  the  life  of  the  Japan 
ese  family  to-day.  It  is  still  thought  that  the  good 
fortune  of  the  household  depends  on  the  observance 
of  its  cult,  and  that  the  greatest  possible  calamity  is 
to  die  without  leaving  a  male  heir  to  perform  the 
rites  and  to  make  the  offerings.  The  paramount 
duty  of  filial  piety  among  the  early  Greeks  and 
Romans  was  to  provide  for  the  perpetuation  of  the 
family  cult;  and  celibacy  was  therefore  generally  for 
bidden,  —  the  obligation  to  marry  being  enforced  by 
opinion  where  not  enforced  by  legislation.  Among 
the  free  classes  of  Old  Japan,  marriage  was  also,  as 
a  general  rule,  obligatory  in  the  case  of  a  male  heir : 
otherwise,  where  celibacy  was  not  condemned  by 
law,  it  was  condemned  by  custom.  To  die  without 
offspring  was,  in  the  case  of  a  younger  son,  chiefly 
a  personal  misfortune  ;  to  die  without  leaving  a  male 
heir,  in  the  case  of  an  elder  son  and  successor,  was 
a  crime  against  the  ancestors, — the  cult  being  thereby 
threatened  with  extinction.  No  excuse  existed  for 
remaining  childless  :  the  family  law  in  Japan,  pre 
cisely  as  in  ancient  Europe,  having  amply  provided 
against  such  a  contingency.  In  case  that  a  wife 
proved  barren,  she  might  be  divorced.  In  case  that 
there  were  reasons  for  not  divorcing  her,  a  concubine 
might  be  taken  for  the  purpose  of  obtaining  an  heir. 
Furthermore,  every  family  representative  was  privi- 


THE  JAPANESE   FAMILY  69 

leged  to  adopt  an  heir.  An  unworthy  son,  again, 
might  be  disinherited,  and  another  young  man 
adopted  in  his  place.  Finally,  in  case  that  a  man 
had  daughters  but  no  son,  the  succession  and  the 
continuance  of  the  cult  could  be  assured  by  adopt 
ing  a  husband  for  the  eldest  daughter. 

But,  as  in  the  antique  European  family,  daughters 
could  not  inherit :  descent  being  in  the  male  line, 
it  was  necessary  to  have  a  male  heir.  In  old  Jap 
anese  belief,  as  in  old  Greek  and  Roman  belief,  the 
father,  not  the  mother,  was  the  life-giver ;  the  crea 
tive  principle  was  masculine  ;  the  duty  of  maintaining 
the  cult  rested  with  the  man,  not  with  the  woman.1 

The  woman  shared  the  cult ;  but  she  could  not 
maintain  it.  Besides,  the  daughters  of  the  family, 
being  destined,  as  a  general  rule,  to  marry  into  other 
households,  could  bear  only  a  temporary  relation  to 
the  home-cult.  It  was  necessary  that  the  religion 
of  the  wife  should  be  the  religion  of  the  husband ; 
and  the  Japanese,  like  the  Greek  woman,  on  marry 
ing  into  another  household,  necessarily  became  at 
tached  to  the  cult  of  her  husband's  family.  For 
this  reason  especially  the  females  in  the  patriarchal 

1  Wherever,  among  ancestor-worshipping  races,  descent  is  in  the  male  line,  the 
cult  follows  the  male  line.  But  the  reader  is  doubtless  aware  that  a  still  more  primi 
tive  form  of  society  than  the  patriarchal  —  the  matriarchal  —  is  supposed  to  have 
had  its  ancestor-worship.  Mr.  Spencer  observes  :  "  What  has  happened  when 
descent  in  the  female  line  obtains,  is  not  clear.  I  have  met  with  no  statement 
showing  that,  in  societies  characterized  by  this  usage,  the  duty  of  administering  to 
the  double  of  the  dead  man  devolved  on  one  of  his  children  rather  than  on  others." 
—  Principles  of  Sociology,  Vol.  Ill,  §  601. 


70  THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY 

family  are  not  equal  to  the  males ;  the  sister  cannot 
rank  with  the  brother.  It  is  true  that  the  Japanese 
daughter,  like  the  Greek  daughter,  could  remain 
attached  to  her  own  family  even  after  marriage,  pro 
viding  that  a  husband  were  adopted  for  her,  —  that 
is  to  say,  taken  into  the  family  as  a  son.  But  even 
in  this  case,  she  could  only  share  in  the  cult,  which  it 
then  became  the  duty  of  the  adopted  husband  to 
maintain. 

The  constitution  of  the  patriarchal  family  every 
where  derives  from  its  ancestral  cult ;  and  before 
considering  the  subjects  of  marriage  and  adoption 
in  Japan,  it  will  be  necessary  to  say  something  about 
the  ancient  family-organization.  The  ancient  family 
was  called  ujiy  —  a  word  said  to  have  originally 
signified  the  same  thing  as  the  modern  term  uchi, 
"  interior,"  or  "  household,"  but  certainly  used  from 
very  early  times  in  the  sense  of  "  name  "  —  clan- 
name  especially.  There  were  two  kinds  of  uji :  the 
0-uji,  or  great  families,  and  the  ko-uji,  or  lesser 
families,  —  either  term  signifying  a  large  body  of 
persons  united  by  kinship,  and  by  the  cult  of  a 
common  ancestor.  The  o-uji  corresponded  in  some 
degree  to  the  Greek  yeVo?  or  the  Roman  gens :  the 
ko-uji  were  its  branches,  and  subordinate  to  it.  The 
unit  of  society  was  the  uji.  Each  o-uji,  with  its 
dependent  ko-uji,  represented  something  like  a 
fhratry  or  curia;  and  all  the  larger  groups  mak- 


THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY  71 

ing  up  the  primitive  Japanese  society  were  but 
multiplications  of  the  «//',  —  whether  we  call  them 
clans,  tribes,  or  hordes.  With  the  advent  of  a 
settled  civilization,  the  greater  groups  necessarily 
divided  and  subdivided ;  but  the  smallest  subdivision 
still  retained  its  primal  organization.  Even  the 
modern  Japanese  family  partly  retains  that  organiza 
tion.  It  does  not  mean  only  a  household :  it  means 
rather  what  the  Greek  or  Roman  family  became 
after  the  dissolution  of  the  gens.  With  ourselves 
the  family  has  been  disintegrated :  when  we  talk 
of  a  man's  family,  we  mean  his  wife  and  children. 
But  the  Japanese  family  is  still  a  large  group.  As 
marriages  take  place  early,  it  may  consist,  even  as 
a  household,  of  great-grandparents,  grandparents, 
parents,  and  children  —  sons  and  daughters  of  sev 
eral  generations ;  but  it  commonly  extends  much 
beyond  the  limits  of  one  household.  In  early  times 
it  might  constitute  the  entire  population  of  a  village 
or  town  ;  and  there  are  still  in  Japan  large  com 
munities  of  persons  all  bearing  the  same  family 
name.  In  some  districts  it  was  formerly  the  cus 
tom  to  keep  all  the  children,  as  far  as  possible, 
within  the  original  family  group  —  husbands  being 
adopted  for  all  the  daughters.  The  group  might 
thus  consist  of  sixty  or  more  persons,  dwelling  under 
the  same  roof;  and  the  houses  were  of  course  con 
structed,  by  successive  extension,  so  as  to  meet  the 
requirement.  (I  am  mentioning  these  curious  facts 


72  THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY 

only  by  way  of  illustration.)  But  the  greater  #//, 
after  the  race  had  settled  down,  rapidly  multiplied ; 
and  although  there  are  said  to  be  house-com 
munities  still  in  some  remote  districts  of  the 
country,  the  primal  patriarchal  groups  must  have 
been  broken  up  almost  everywhere  at  some  very 
early  period.  Thereafter  the  main  cult  of  the  uji 
did  not  cease  to  be  the  cult  also  of  its  sub-divi 
sions  :  all  members  of  the  original  gens  continued 
to  worship  the  common  ancestor,  or  uji-no-kami^ 
"  the  god  of  the  uji.1'  By  degrees  the  ghost-house 
of  the  uji-no-kami  became  transformed  into  the 
modern  Shint5  parish-temple ;  and  the  ancestral 
spirit  became  the  local  tutelar  god,  whose  modern 
appellation,  ujigami^  is  but  a  shortened  form  of  his 
ancient  title,  uji-no-kami.  Meanwhile,  after  the  gen 
eral  establishment  of  the  domestic  cult,  each  separate 
household  maintained  the  special  cult  of  its  own 
dead,  in  addition  to  the  communal  cult.  This 
religious  condition  still  continues.  The  family 
may  include  several  households  ;  but  each  house 
hold  maintains  the  cult  of  its  dead.  And  the  family- 
group,  whether  large  or  small,  preserves  its  ancient 
constitution  and  character;  it  is  still  a  religious 
society,  exacting  obedience,  on  the  part  of  all  its 
members,  to  traditional  custom. 

So    much    having    been    explained,  the    customs 
regarding  marriage  and  adoption,  in   their   relation 


THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY  73 

to  the  family  hierarchy,  can  be  clearly  understood. 
But  a  word  first  regarding  this  hierarchy,  as  it  exists 
to-day.  Theoretically  the  power  of  the  head  of  the 
family  is  still  supreme  in  the  household.  All  must 
obey  the  head.  Furthermore  the  females  must 
obey  the  males  —  the  wives,  the  husbands ;  and  the 
younger  members  of  the  family  are  subject  to  the 
elder  members.  The  children  must  not  only  obey 
the  parents  and  grandparents,  but  must  observe 
among  themselves  the  domestic  law  of  seniority: 
thus  the  younger  brother  should  obey  the  elder 
brother,  and  the  younger  sister  the  elder  sister. 
The  rule  of  precedence  is  enforced  gently,  and  is 
cheerfully  obeyed  even  in  small  matters :  for  ex 
ample,  at  meal-time,  the  elder  boy  is  served  first, 
the  second  son  next,  and  so  on,  —  an  exception 
being  made  in  the  case  of  a  very  young  child,  who 
is  not  obliged  to  wait.  This  custom  accounts  for 
an  amusing  popular  term  often  applied  in  jest  to 
a  second  son,  "  Master  Cold-Rice  "  (Hiameshi-San) ; 
as  the  second  son,  having  to  wait  until  both  infants 
and  elders  have  been  served,  is  not  likely  to  find  his 
portion  desirably  hot  when  it  reaches  him.  .  .  . 
Legally,  the  family  can  have  but  one  responsible 
head.  It  may  be  the  grandfather,  the  father,  or  the 
eldest  son  ;  and  it  is  generally  the  eldest  son,  be 
cause  according  to  a  custom  of  Chinese  origin,  the 
old  folks  usually  resign  their  active  authority  as  soon 
as  the  eldest  son  is  able  to  take  charge  of  affairs. 


74  THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY 

The  subordination  of  young  to  old,  and  of  females 
to  males,  —  in  fact  the  whole  existing  constitution 
of  the  family,  —  suggests  a  great  deal  in  regard  to 
the  probably  stricter  organization  of  the  patriarchal 
family,  whose  chief  was  at  once  ruler  and  priest,  with 
almost  unlimited  powers.  The  organization  was 
primarily,  and  still  remains,  religious :  the  marital 
bond  did  not  constitute  the  family  ;  and  the  relation 
of  the  parent  to  the  household  depended  upon  his 
or  her  relation  to  the  family  as  a  religious  body. 
To-day  also,  the  girl  adopted  into  a  household  as 
wife  ranks  only  as  an  adopted  child  :  marriage  signi 
fies  adoption.  She  is  called  "  flower-daughter " 
(hana-yome).  In  like  manner,  and  for  the  same 
reasons,  the  young  man  received  into  a  household 
as  a  husband  of  one  of  the  daughters,  ranks  merely 
as  an  adopted  son.  The  adopted  bride  or  bride 
groom  is  necessarily  subject  to  the  elders,  and  may 
be  dismissed  by  their  decision.  As  for  the  adopted 
husband,  his  position  is  both  delicate  and  difficult, 
—  as  an  old  Japanese  proverb  bears  witness : 
Konuka  san-go  areba,  mukoyoshi  to  naruna  ("  While 
you  have  even  three  go1  of  rice-bran  left,  do  not  be 
come  a  son-in-law  ").  Jacob  does  not  have  to  wait 
for  Rachel :  he  is  given  to  Rachel  on  demand ;  and 
his  service  then  begins.  And  after  twice  seven 
years  of  service,  Jacob  may  be  sent  away.  In  that 
event  his  children  do  not  any  more  belong  to  him, 

1 A  go  is  something  more  than  a  pint. 


THE  JAPANESE   FAMILY  75 

but  to  the  family.  His  adoption  may  hare  had 
nothing  to  do  with  affection ;  and  his  dismissal  may 
have  nothing  to  do  with  misconduct.  Such  matters, 
however  they  may  be  settled  in  law,  are  really  de 
cided  by  family  interests  —  interests  relating  to  the 
maintenance  of  the  house  and  of  its  cult.1 

It  should  not  be  forgotten  that,  although  a 
daughter-in-law  or  a  son-in-law  could  in  former 
times  be  dismissed  almost  at  will,  the  question  of 
marriage  in  the  old  Japanese  family  was  a  matter 
of  religious  importance,  —  marriage  being  one  of 
the  chief  duties  of  filial  piety.  This  was  also  the 
case  in  the  early  Greek  and  Roman  family  ;  and  the 
marriage  ceremony  was  performed,  as  it  is  now  per 
formed  in  Japan,  not  at  a  temple,  but  in  the  home. 
It  was  a  rite  of  the  family  religion,  —  the  rite  by 
which  the  bride  was  adopted  into  the  cult  in  the 
supposed  presence  of  the  ancestral  spirits.  Among 
the  primitive  Japanese  there  was  probably  no  cor 
responding  ceremony ;  but  after  the  establishment 
of  the  domestic  cult,  the  marriage  ceremony  became 
a  religious  rite,  and  this  it  still  remains.  Ordinary 
marriages  are  not,  however,  performed  before  the 
household  shrine  or  in  front  of  the  ancestral  tablets, 
except  under  certain  circumstances.  The  rule,  as 
regards  such  ordinary  marriages,  seems  to  be  that 

*  Recent  legislation  has  been  in  favour  of  the  mukoyoshi  j  but,  as  a  rule,  the  la'JV 
is  seldom  resorted  to  except  by  men  dismissed  from  the  family  for  misconduct,  and 
anxious  to  make  profit  by  the  dismissal. 


76  THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY 

if  the  parents  of  the  bridegroom  are  yet  alive,  this 
is  not  done ;  but  if  they  are  dead,  then  the  bride 
groom  leads  his  bride  before  their  mortuary  tablets, 
where  she  makes  obeisance.  Among  the  nobility, 
in  former  times  at  least,  the  marriage  ceremony 
appears  to  have  been  more  distinctly  religious,  — 
judging  from  the  following  curious  relation  in  the 
book  Shorei-Hikkiy  or  "  Record  of  Ceremonies  "  * : 
"  At  the  weddings  of  the  great,  the  bridal-chamber 
is  composed  of  three  rooms  thrown  into  one  \_by 
removal  of  the  sitting-screens  ordinarily  separating 
them\)  and  newly  decorated.  .  .  .  The  shrine  for 
the  image  of  the  family-god  is  placed  upon  a  shelf 
adjoining  the  sleeping-place/1  It  is  noteworthy 
also  that  Imperial  marriages  are  always  officially 
announced  to  the  ancestors  ;  and  that  the  marriage 
of  the  heir-apparent,  or  other  male  offspring  of  the 
Imperial  house,  is  performed  before  the  Kashiko- 
dokoro,  or  imperial  temple  of  the  ancestors,  which 
stands  within  the  palace-grounds.2  As  a  general 
rule  it  would  appear  that  the  evolution  of  the  mar 
riage-ceremony  in  Japan  chiefly  followed  Chinese 
precedent ;  and  in  the  Chinese  patriarchal  family 
the  ceremony  is  in  its  own  way  quite  as  much  of 
a  religious  rite  as  the  early  Greek  or  Roman  mar 
riage.  And  though  the  relation  of  the  Japanese 

1  The  translation  is  Mr.  Mitford's.      There  are  no  "  images"  of  the  family- 
god,   and  I  suppose  that  the  family's  Shinto-shrine  is  meant,  with  its  ancestral 
tablets. 

2  This  was  the  case  at  the  marriage  of  the  present  Crown-Prince. 


THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY  ;; 

rite  to  the  family  cult  is  less  marked,  it  becomes 
sufficiently  clear  upon  investigation.  The  alternate 
drinking  of  rice-wine,  by  bridegroom  and  bride,  from 
the  same  vessels,  corresponds  in  a  sort  to  the  Roman 
confarreatio.  By  the  wedding-rite  the  bride  is  adopted 
into  the  family  religion.  She  is  adopted  not  only 
by  the  living  but  by  the  dead ;  she  must  there 
after  revere  the  ancestors  of  her  husband  as  her  own 
ancestors ;  and  should  there  be  no  elders  in  the 
household,  it  will  become  her  duty  to  make  the 
offerings,  as  representative  of  her  husband.  With 
the  cult  of  her  own  family  she  has  nothing  more  to 
do ;  and  the  funeral  ceremonies  performed  upon  her 
departure  from  the  parental  roof,  —  the  solemn 
sweeping-out  of  the  house-rooms,  the  lighting  of 
the  death-fire  before  the  gate,  —  are  significant  of 
this  religious  separation. 

Speaking  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  marriage, 
M.  de  Coulanges  observes :  "  Une  telle  religion  ne 
pouvait  pas  admettre  la  polygamie"  As  relating  to 
the  highly  developed  domestic  cult  of  those  com 
munities  considered  by  the  author  of  La  Cit'e  Antique ', 
his  statement  will  scarcely  be  called  in  question. 
But  as  regards  ancestor-worship  in  general,  it  would 
be  incorrect ;  since  polygamy  or  polygyny,  and 
polyandry  may  coexist  with  ruder  forms  of  ancestor- 
worship.  The  Western-Aryan  societies,  in  the 
epoch  studied  by  M.  de  Coulanges,  were  practically 


78  THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY 

monogamic.  The  ancient  Japanese  society  wa% 
polygynous  ;  and  polygyny  persisted,  after  the  estab 
lishment  of  the  domestic  cult.  In  early  times,  the 
marital  relation  itself  would  seem  to  have  been  in 
definite.  No  distinction  was  made  between  the  wife 
and  the  concubines  :  "  they  were  classed  together  as 
c  women.'  '  Probably  under  Chinese  influence  the 
distinction  was  afterwards  sharply  drawn ;  and  with 
the  progress  of  civilization,  the  general  tendency 
was  towards  monogamy,  although  the  ruling  classes 
remained  polygynous.  In  the  54th  article  of  lye- 
yasu's  legacy,  this  phase  of  the  social  condition  is 
clearly  expressed, — a  condition  which  prevailed  down 
to  the  present  era  :  — 

"The  position  a  wife  holds  towards  a  concubine  is  the 
same  as  that  of  a  lord  to  his  vassal.  The  Emperor  has 
twelve  imperial  concubines.  The  princes  may  have  eight 
concubines.  Officers  of  the  highest  class  may  have  five 
mistresses.  A  Samurai  may  have  two  handmaids.  All 
below  this  are  ordinary  married  men." 

This  would  suggest  that  concubinage  had  long 
been  (with  some  possible  exceptions)  an  exclusive 
privilege ;  and  that  it  should  have  persisted  down  to 
the  period  of  the  abolition  of  the  daimiates  and  of 
the  military  class,  is  sufficiently  explained  by  the 
militant  character  of  the  ancient  society.2  Though 

1  Satow  :    The  Revival  of  Pure  Sbintau. 

3  See  especially  Herbert  Spencer's  chapter,  "The  Family,"  in  Vol.  I,  Princ* 
files  of  Sociology,  \  315. 


THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY  79 

it  is  untrue  that  domestic  ancestor-worship  cannot 
coexist  with  polygamy  or  polygyny  (Mr.  Spencer's 
term  is  the  most  inclusive),  it  is  at  least  true  that 
such  worship  is  favoured  by  the  monogamic  relation, 
and  tends  therefore  to  establish  it,  —  since  monog 
amy  insures  to  the  family  succession  a  stability  that 
no  other  relation  can  offer.  We  may  say  that,  al 
though  the  old  Japanese  society  was  not  mono 
gamic,  the  natural  tendency  was  towards  monogamy, 
as  the  condition  best  according  with  the  religion 
of  the  family,  and  with  the  moral  feeling  of  the 
masses. 

Once  that  the  domestic  ancestor-cult  had  become 
universally  established,  the  question  of  marriage,  as 
a  duty  of  filial  pity,  could  not  be  judiciously  left 
to  the  will  of  the  young  people  themselves.  It  was 
a  matter  to  be  decided  by  the  family,  not  by  the 
children ;  for  mutual  inclination  could  not  be  suf 
fered  to  interfere  with  the  requirements  of  the  house 
hold  religion.  It  was  not  a  question  of  affection, 
but  of  religious  duty ;  and  to  think  otherwise  was 
impious.  Affection  might  and  ought  to  spring  up 
from  the  relation.  But  any  affection  powerful  enough 
to  endanger  the  cohesion  of  the  family  would  be 
condemned.  A  wife  might  therefore  be  divorced 
because  her  husband  had  become  too  much  attached 
to  her ;  an  adopted  husband  might  be  divorced  be 
cause  of  his  power  to  exercise,  through  affection,  too 


8o  THE  JAPANESE   FAMILY 

great  an  influence  upon  the  daughter  of  the  house. 
Other  causes  would  probably  be  found  for  the 
divorce  in  either  case  —  but  they  would  not  be 
difficult  to  find. 

For  the  same  reason  that  connubial  affection  could 
be  tolerated  only  within  limits,  the  natural  rights  of 
parenthood  (as  we  understand  them)  were  necessarily 
restricted  in  the  old  Japanese  household.  Marriage 
being  for  the  purpose  of  obtaining  heirs  to  perpetu 
ate  the  cult,  the  children  were  regarded  as  belonging 
to  the  family  rather  than  to  the  father  and  mother. 
Hence,  in  case  of  divorcing  the  son's  wife,  or  the 
adopted  son-in-law,  —  or  of  disinheriting  the  married 
son,  —  the  children  would  be  retained  by  the  family. 
For  the  natural  right  of  the  young  parents  was  con 
sidered  subordinate  to  the  religious  rights  of  the 
house.  In  opposition  to  those  rights,  no  other 
rights  could  be  tolerated.  Practically,  of  course, 
according  to  more  or  less  fortunate  circumstances, 
the  individual  might  enjoy  freedom  under  the  pater 
nal  roof;  but  theoretically  and  legally  there  was  no 
freedom  in  the  old  Japanese  family  for  any  member 
of  it,  —  not  excepting  even  its  acknowledged  chief, 
whose  responsibilities  were  great.  Every  person, 
from  the  youngest  child  up  to  the  grandfather,  was 
subject  to  somebody  else  ;  and  every  act  of  domestic 
life  was  regulated  by  traditional  custom. 

Like  the  Greek  or  Roman  father,  the  patriarch 
of  the  Japanese  family  appears  to  have  had  in  early 


THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY  81 

times  powers  of  life  and  death  over  all  the  members 
of  the  household.  In  the  ruder  ages  the  father 
might  either  kill  or  sell  his  children  ;  and  afterwards, 
among  the  ruling  classes  his  powers  remained  almost 
unlimited  until  modern  times.  Allowing  for  cer 
tain  local  exceptions,  explicable  by  tradition,  or  class- 
exceptions,  explicable  by  conditions  of  servitude,  it 
may  be  said  that  originally  the  Japanese  pater 
familias  was  at  once  ruler,  priest,  and  magistrate 
within  the  family.  He  could  compel  his  children 
to  marry  or  forbid  them  to  marry ;  he  could  dis 
inherit  or  repudiate  them ;  he  could  ordain  the  pro 
fession  or  calling  which  they  were  to  follow ;  and 
his  power  extended  to  all  members  of  the  family, 
and  to  the  household  dependents.  At  different 
epochs  limits  were  placed  to  the  exercise  of  this 
power,  in  the  case  of  the  ordinary  people;  but  in 
the  military  class,  the  patria  potestas  was  almost  un 
restricted.  In  its  extreme  form,  the  paternal  power 
controlled  everything,  —  the  right  to  life  and  liberty, 

—  the  right  to  marry,  or  to  keep  the  wife  or  husband 
already  espoused, — the  right  to  one's  own  children, 

—  the  right  to  hold  property,  —  the  right  to  hold 
office,  —  the  right  to  choose  or  follow  an  occupation. 
The  family  was  a  despotism. 

It  should  not  be  forgotten,  however,  that  the 
absolutism  prevailing  in  the  patriarchal  family  has 
its  justification  in  a  religious  belief, — in  the  convic 
tion  that  everything  should  be  sacrificed  for  the  sake 


82  THE  JAPANESE   FAMILY 

of  the  cult,  and  every  member  of  the  family  should 
be  ready  to  give  up  even  life,  if  necessary,  to  assure 
the  perpetuity  of  the  succession.  Remembering 
this,  it  becomes  easy  to  understand  why,  even  in 
communities  otherwise  advanced  in  civilization,  it 
should  have  seemed  right  that  a  father  could  kill  or 
sell  his  children.  The  crime  of  a  son  might  result 
in  the  extinction  of  a  cult  through  the  ruin  of  the 
family,  —  especially  in  a  militant  society  like  that 
of  Japan,  where  the  entire  family  was  held  respon 
sible  for  the  acts  of  each  of  its  members,  so  that  a 
capital  offence  would  involve  the  penalty  of  death 
on  the  whole  of  the  household,  including  the  chil 
dren.  Again,  the  sale  of  a  daughter,  in  time  of  ex 
treme  need,  might  save  a  house  from  ruin  ;  and  filial 
piety  exacted  submission  to  such  sacrifice  for  the 
sake  of  the  cult. 

As  in  the  Aryan  family,1  property  descended  by 
right  of  primogeniture  from  father  to  son ;  the 
eldest-born,  even  in  cases  where  the  other  property 
was  to  be  divided  among  the  children,  always  inherit 
ing  the  homestead.  The  homestead  property  was, 
however,  family  property  ;  and  it  passed  to  the  eldest 
son  as  representative,  not  as  individual.  Generally 
speaking,  sons  could  not  hold  property,  without  the 
father's  consent,  during  such  time  as  he  retained  his 

1  The  laws  of  succession  in  Old  Japan  differed  considerably  according  to  class, 
place,  and  era ;  the  entire  subject  has  not  yet  been  fully  treated  ;  and  only  a  fe\* 
safe  general  statements  can  be  ventured  at  the  present  time. 


THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY  83 

headship.  As  a  rule,  —  to  which  there  were  various 
exceptions,  —  a  daughter  could  not  inherit;  and  in 
the  case  of  an  only  daughter,  for  whom  a  husband 
had  been  adopted,  the  homestead  property  would 
pass  to  the  adopted  husband,  because  (until  within 
recent  times)  a  woman  could  not  become  the  head 
of  a  family.  This  was  the  case  also  in  the  Western 
Aryan  household,  in  ancestor-worshipping  times. 

To  modern  thinking,  the  position  of  woman  in 
the  old  Japanese  family  appears  to  have  been  the 
reverse  of  happy.  As  a  child  she  was  subject,  not 
only  to  the  elders,  but  to  all  the  male  adults  of 
the  household.  Adopted  into  another  household  as 
wife,  she  merely  passed  into  a  similar  state  of  sub 
jection,  unalleviated  by  the  affection  which  parental 
and  fraternal  ties  assured  her  in  the  ancestral  home. 
Her  retention  in  the  family  of  her  husband  did  not 
depend  upon  his  affection,  but  upon  the  will  of  the 
majority,  and  especially  of  the  elders.  Divorced, 
she  could  not  claim  her  children  :  they  belonged  to 
the  family  of  the  husband.  In  any  event  her  duties 
as  wife  were  more  trying  than  those  of  a  hired  ser 
vant.  Only  in  old  age  could  she  hope  to  exercise 
some  authority ;  but  even  in  old  age  she  was  under 
tutelage  —  throughout  her  entire  life  she  was  in  tute 
lage.  "  A  woman  can  have  no  house  of  her  own 
in  the  Three  Universes,"  declared  an  old  Japanese 
proverb.  Neither  could  she  have  a  cult  of  her  own: 
there  was  no  special  cult  for  the  women  of  a  family 


84  THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY 

—  no  ancestral  rite  distinct  from  that  of  the  husband. 
And  the  higher  the  rank  of  the  family  into  which 
she  entered  by  marriage,  the  more  difficult  would  be 
her  position.  For  a  woman  of  the  aristocratic  class 
no  freedom  existed:  she  could  not  even  pass  beyond 
her  own  gate  except  in  a  palanquin  (kago)  or  under 
escort ;  and  her  existence  as  a  wife  was  likely  to 
be  embittered  by  the  presence  of  concubines  in  the 
house. 

Such  was  the  patriarchal  family  in  old  times ;  yet 
it  is  probable  that  conditions  were  really  better  than 
the  laws  and  the  customs  would  suggest.  The  race 
is  a  joyous  and  kindly  one ;  and  it  discovered,  long 
centuries  ago,  many  ways  of  smoothing  the  difficul 
ties  of  life,  and  of  modifying  the  harsher  exactions 
of  law  and  custom.  The  great  powers  of  the  family- 
head  were  probably  but  seldom  exercised  in  cruel 
directions.  He  might  have  legal  rights  of  the  most 
formidable  character;  but  these  were  required  by 
reason  of  his  responsibilities,  and  were  not  likely 
to  be  used  against  communal  judgment.  It  must 
be  remembered  that  the  individual  was  not  legally 
considered  in  former  times  :  the  family  only  was 
recognized ;  and  the  head  of  it  legally  existed  only 
as  representative.  If  he  erred,  the  whole  family 
was  liable  to  suffer  the  penalty  of  his  error.  Fur 
thermore,  every  extreme  exercise  of  his  authority 
involved  proportionate  responsibilities.  He  could 


THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY  85 

divorce  his  wife,  or  compel  his  son  to  divorce  the 
adopted  daughter-in-law ;  but  in  either  case  he 
would  have  to  account  for  this  action  to  the  family 
of  the  divorced ;  and  the  divorce-right,  especially 
in  the  samurai  class,  was  greatly  restrained  by  the 
fear  of  family  resentment ;  the  unjust  dismissal  of  a 
wife  being  counted  as  an  insult  to  her  kindred.  He 
might  disinherit  an  only  son ;  but  in  that  event  he 
would  be  obliged  to  adopt  a  kinsman.  He  might 
kill  or  sell  either  son  or  daughter;  but  unless  he 
belonged  to  some  abject  class,  he  would  have  to 
justify  his  action  to  the  community.1  He  might  be 
reckless  in  his  management  of  the  family  property ; 
but  in  that  case  an  appeal  to  communal  authority 
was  possible,  and  the  appeal  might  result  in  his 
deposition.  So  far  as  we  are  able  to  judge  from  the 
remains  of  old  Japanese  law  which  have  been  studied, 
it  would  seem  to  have  been  the  general  rule  that  the 
family-head  could  not  sell  or  alienate  the  estate. 
Though  the  family-rule  was  despotic,  it  was  the 
rule  of  a  body  rather  than  of  a  chief;  the  family- 
head  really  exercising  authority  in  the  name  of  the 
rest.  ...  In  this  sense,  the  family  still  remains 
a  despotism ;  but  the  powers  of  its  legal  head  are 
now  checked,  from  within  as  well  as  from  without, 

1  Samurai  fathers  might  kill  a  daughter  convicted  of  unchastity,  or  kill  a  son 
guilty  of  any  action  calculated  to  disgrace  the  family  name.  But  they  would  not 
sell  a  child.  The  sale  of  daughters  was  practised  only  by  the  abject  classes,  or  by 
families  of  other  castes  reduced  to  desperate  extremities.  A  girl  might,  however, 
sell  herself  for  the  sake  of  her  family. 


86  THE  JAPANESE   FAMILY 

by  later  custom.  The  acts  of  adoption,  disinherit 
ance,  marriage,  or  divorce,  are  decided  usually  by 
general  consent ;  and  the  decision  of  the  household 
and  kindred  is  required  in  the  taking  of  any  impor 
tant  step  to  the  disadvantage  of  the  individual. 

Of  course  the  old  family-organization  had  certain 
advantages  which  largely  compensated  the  individual 
for  his  state  of  subjection.  It  was  a  society  of 
mutual  help  ;  and  it  was  not  less  powerful  to  give 
aid,  than  to  enforce  obedience.  Every  member 
could  do  something  to  assist  another  member  in 
case  of  need  :  each  had  a  right  to  the  protection  of 
all.  This  remains  true  of  the  family  to-day.  In  a 
well-conducted  household,  where  every  act  is  per 
formed  according  to  the  old  forms  of  courtesy  and 
kindness,  —  where  no  harsh  word  is  ever  spoken, 
—  where  the  young  look  up  to  the  aged  with  affec 
tionate  respect,  —  where  those  whom  years  have  inca 
pacitated  for  more  active  duty,  take  upon  themselves 
the  care  of  the  children,  and  render  priceless  service 
in  teaching  and  training, — -an  ideal  condition  has 
been  realized.  The  daily  life  of  such  a  home,  —  in 
which  the  endeavour  of  each  is  to  make  existence 
as  pleasant  as  possible  for  all,  —  in  which  the  bond 
of  union  is  really  love  and  gratitude,  —  represents 
religion  in  the  best  and  purest  sense ;  and  the  place 
is  holy.  .  .  . 

It  remains  to  speak  of  the  dependants  in    the 


THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY  87 

ancient  family.  Though  the  fact  has  not  yet  been 
fully  established,  it  is  probable  that  the  first  do 
mestics  were  slaves  or  serfs ;  and  the  condition  of 
servants  in  later  times,  —  especially  of  those  in 
families  of  the  ruling  classes,  —  was  much  like  that 
of  slaves  in  the  early  Greek  and  Roman  families. 
Though  necessarily  treated  as  inferiors,  they  were 
regarded  as  members  of  the  household :  they  were 
trusted  familiars,  permitted  to  share  in  the  pleasures 
of  the  family,  and  to  be  present  at  most  of  its 
reunions.  They  could  legally  be  dealt  with  harshly  ; 
but  there  is  little  doubt  that,  as  a  rule,  they  were 
treated  kindly,  —  absolute  loyalty  being  expected 
from  them.  The  best  indication  of  their  status  in 
past  times  is  furnished  by  yet  surviving  customs. 
Though  the  power  of  the  family  over  the  servant 
no  longer  exists  in  law  or  in  fact,  the  pleasant  fea 
tures  of  the  old  relation  continue ;  and  they  are  of 
no  little  interest.  The  family  takes  a  sincere  in 
terest  in  the  welfare  of  its  domestics,  —  almost  such 
interest  as  would  be  shown  in  the  case  of  poorer 
kindred.  Formerly  the  family  furnishing  servants 
to  a  household  of  higher  rank,  stood  to  the  latter 
in  the  relation  of  vassal  to  liege-lord ;  and  between 
the  two  there  existed  a  real  bond  of  loyalty  and 
kindliness.  The  occupation  of  servant  was  then 
hereditary ;  children  were  trained  for  the  duty 
from  an  early  age.  After  the  man-servant  or  maid 
servant  had  arrived  at  a  certain  age,  permission  to 


88  THE   JAPANESE    FAMILY 

marry  was  accorded ;  and  the  relation  of  service 
then  ceased,  but  not  the  bond  of  loyalty.  The 
children  of  the  married  servants  would  be  sent, 
when  old  enough,  to  work  in  the  house  of  the 
master,  and  would  leave  it  only  when  the  time  also 
came  for  them  to  marry.  Relations  of  this  kind 
still  exist  between  certain  aristocratic  families  and 
former  vassal-families,  and  conserve  some  charming 
traditions  and  customs  of  hereditary  service,  un 
changed  for  hundreds  of  years. 

In  feudal  times,  of  course,  the  bond  between 
master  and  servant  was  of  the  most  serious  kind ; 
the  latter  being  expected,  in  case  of  need,  to  sac 
rifice  life  and  all  else  for  the  sake  of  the  master  or 
of  the  master's  household.  This  also  was  the  loy 
alty  demanded  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  domestic, 
—  before  there  had  yet  come  into  existence  that 
inhuman  form  of  servitude  which  reduced  the  toiler 
to  the  condition  of  a  beast  of  burden ;  and  the 
relation  was  partly  a  religious  one.  There  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  in  ancient  Japan  any  custom  cor 
responding  to  that,  described  by  M.  de  Coulanges, 
of  adopting  the  Greek  or  Roman  servant  into  the 
household  cult.  But  as  the  Japanese  vassal-families 
furnishing  domestics  were,  as  vassals,  necessarily 
attached  to  the  clan-cult  of  their  lord,  the  relation 
of  the  servant  to  the  family  was  to  some  extent  a 
religious  bond. 


THE   JAPANESE   FAMILY  89 

The  reader  will  be  able  to  understand,  from  the 
facts  of  this  chapter,  to  what  extent  the  individual 
was  sacrificed  to  the  family,  as  a  religious  body. 
From  servant  to  master  —  up  through  all  degrees 
of  the  household  hierarchy  —  the  law  of  duty  was 
the  same :  obedience  absolute  to  custom  and  tradi 
tion.  The  ancestral  cult  permitted  no  individual 
freedom  :  nobody  could  live  according  to  his  or  her 
pleasure ;  every  one  had  to  live  according  to  rule. 
The  individual  did  not  even  have  a  legal  existence ; 
—  the  family  was  the  unit  of  society.  Even  its  pa 
triarch  existed  in  law  as  representative  only, — 
responsible  both  to  the  living  and  the  dead.  His 
public  responsibility,  however,  was  not  determined 
merely  by  civil  law.  It  was  determined  by  another 
religious  bond,  —  that  of  the  ancestral  cult  of  the 
clan  or  tribe ;  and  this  public  form  of  ancestor- 
worship  was  even  more  exacting  than  the  religion 
of  the  home. 


The  Communal  Cult 


The  Communal   Cult 

AS  by  the  religion  of  the  household  each  indi 
vidual  was  ruled  in  every  action  of  domestic 
life,  so,  by  the  religion  of  the  village  or  dis 
trict  the  family  was  ruled  in  all  its  relations  to  the 
outer  world.  Like  the  religion  of  the  home,  the 
religion  of  the  commune  was  ancestor-worship. 
What  the  household  shrine  represented  to  the 
family,  the  Shint5  parish-temple  represented  to 
the  community ;  and  the  deity  there  worshipped 
as  tutelar  god  was  called  Ujigami>  the  god  of  the 
Uji,  which  term  originally  signified  the  patriarchal 
family  or  gensy  as  well  as  the  family  name. 

Some  obscurity  still  attaches  to  the  question  of 
the  original  relation  of  the  community  to  the  Uji- 
god.  Hirata  declares  the  god  of  the  Uji  to  have 
been  the  common  ancestor  of  the  clan-family,  —  the 
ghost  of  the  first  patriarch ;  and  this  opinion  (allow 
ing  for  sundry  exceptions)  is  almost  certainly  correct. 
But  it  is  difficult  to  decide  whether  the  Uji-ko,  or 
"  children  of  the  family  "  (as  Shinto  parishioners  are 
still  termed)  at  first  included  only  the  descendants  of 
the  clan-ancestor,  or  also  the  whole  of  the  inhabit- 

93 


94  THE    COMMUNAL    CULT 

ants  of  the  district  ruled  by  the  clan.  It  is  certainly 
not  true  at  the  present  time  that  the  tutelar  deity  of 
each  Japanese  district  represents  the  common  ances 
tor  of  its  inhabitants,  —  though,  to  this  general  rule, 
there  might  be  found  exception  in  some  of  the 
remoter  provinces.  Most  probably  the  god  of  the 
Uji  was  first  worshipped  by  the  people  of  the  district 
rather  as  the  spirit  of  a  former  ruler,  or  the  patron- 
god  of  a  ruling  family,  than  as  the  spirit  of  a  com 
mon  ancestor.  It  has  been  tolerably  well  proved 
that  the  bulk  of  the  Japanese  people  were  in  a 
state  of  servitude  from  before  the  beginning  of  the 
historic  period,  and  so  remained  until  within  com 
paratively  recent  times.  The  subject-classes  may 
not  have  had  at  first  a  cult  of  their  own :  their 
religion  would  most  likely  have  been  that  of  their 
masters.  In  later  times  the  vassal  was  certainly 
attached  to  the  cult  of  the  lord.  But  it  is  difficult 
as  yet  to  venture  any  general  statement  as  to  the 
earliest  phase  of  the  communal  cult  in  Japan ;  for 
the  history  of  the  Japanese  nation  is  not  that  of  a 
single  people  of  one  blood,  but  a  history  of  many 
clan-groups,  of  different  origin,  gradually  brought 
together  to  form  one  huge  patriarchal  society. 

However,  it  is  quite  safe  to  assume,  with  the 
best  native  authorities,  that  the  Ujigami  were  origi 
nally  clan-deities,  and  that  they  were  usually,, 
though  not  invariably,  worshipped  as  clan-ancestors. 


THE    COMMUNAL   CULT  95 

Some  Ujigami  belong  to  the  historic  period.  The 
war  god  Hachiman,  for  example,  —  to  whom  parish- 
temples  are  dedicated  in  almost  every  large  city, — 
is  the  apotheosized  spirit  of  the  Emperor  Ojin, 
patron  of  the  famed  Minamoto  clan.  This  is  an 
example  of  Ujigami  worship  in  which  the  clan-god  is 
not  an  ancestor.  But  in  many  instances  the  Uji 
gami  is  really  the  ancestor  of  an  Uji ;  as  in  the 
case  of  the  great  deity  of  Kasuga,  from  whom  the 
Fujiwara  clan  claimed  descent.  Altogether  there 
were  in  ancient  Japan,  after  the  beginning  of  the 
historic  era,  1182  clans,  great  and  small;  and  these 
appear  to  have  established  the  same  number  of  cults. 
We  find,  as  might  be  expected,  that  the  temples 
now  called  Ujigami  —  which  is  to  say,  Shint5  parish- 
temples  in  general  —  are  always  dedicated  to  a  par 
ticular  class  of  divinities,  and  never  dedicated  to 
certain  other  gods.  Also,  it  is  significant  that  in 
every  large  town  there  are  Shinto  temples  dedicated 
to  the  same  Uji-gods,  —  proving  the  transfer  of  com 
munal  worship  from  its  place  of  origin.  Thus  the 
Izumo  worshipper  of  Kasuga-Sama  can  find  in 
Osaka,  Kyoto,  Tokyo,  parish-temples  dedicated  to 
his  patron :  the  Kyushu  worshipper  of  Hachiman- 
Sama  can  place  himself  under  the  protection  of  the 
same  deity  in  Musashi  quite  as  well  as  in  Higo  or 
Bungo.  Another  fact  worth  observing  is  that  the 
Ujigami  temple  is  not  necessarily  the  most  important 
Shint5  temple  in  the  parish :  it  is  the  parish-temple, 


96  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

and  important  to  the  communal  worship  ;  but  it  may 
be  outranked  and  overshadowed  by  some  adjacent 
temple  dedicated  to  higher  Shintd  gods.  Thus  in 
Kitzuki  of  Izumo,  for  example,  the  great  Izumo 
temple  is  not  the  Ujigami, —  not  the  parish-temple  ; 
the  local  cult  is  maintained  at  a  much  smaller 
temple.  .  .  .  Of  the  higher  cults  I  shall  speak 
further  on ;  for  the  present  let  us  consider  only  the 
communal  cult,  in  its  relation  to  communal  life. 
From  the  social  conditions  represented  by  the  wor 
ship  of  the  Ujigami  to-day,  much  can  be  inferred  as 
to  its  influence  in  past  times. 

Almost  every  Japanese  village  has  its  Ujigami ; 
and  each  district  of  every  large  town  or  city  also  has 
its  Ujigami.  The  worship  of  the  tutelar  deity  is 
maintained  by  the  whole  body  of  parishioners,  — 
the  Ujiko,  or  children  of  the  tutelar  god.  Every 
such  parish-temple  has  its  holy  days,  when  all  Ujiko 
are  expected  to  visit  the  temple,  and  when,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  every  household  sends  at  least  one 
representative  to  the  Ujigami.  There  are  great 
festival-days  and  ordinary  festival-days ;  there  are 
processions,  music,  dancing,  and  whatever  in  the 
way  of  popular  amusement  can  serve  to  make 
the  occasion  attractive.  The  people  of  adjacent 
districts  vie  with  each  other  in  rendering  their 
respective  temple-festivals  (matsuri)  enjoyable :  every 
household  contributes  according  to  its  means. 


THE   COMMUNAL   CULT  97 

The  Shinto  parish-temple  has  an  intimate  relation 
to  the  life  of  the  community  as  a  body,  and  also  to 
the  individual  existence  of  every  Ujiko.  As  a  baby 
he  or  she  is  taken  to  the  Ujigami  —  (at  the  expira 
tion  of  thirty-one  days  after  birth  if  a  boy,  or  thirty- 
three  days  after  birth  if  a  girl)  —  and  placed  under 
the  protection  of  the  god,  in  whose  supposed  pres 
ence  the  little  one's  name  is  recorded.  Thereafter 
the  child  is  regularly  taken  to  the  temple  on  holy 
days,  and  of  course  to  all  the  big  festivals,  which  are 
made  delightful  to  young  fancy  by  the  display  of 
toys  on  sale  in  temporary  booths,  and  by  the  amus 
ing  spectacles  to  be  witnessed  in  the  temple  grounds, 
—  artists  forming  pictures  on  the  pavement  with 
coloured  sands,  —  sweetmeat-sellers  moulding  ani 
mals  and  monsters  out  of  sugar-paste,  —  conjurors 
and  tumblers  exhibiting  their  skill.  .  .  .  Later,  when 
the  child  becomes  strong  enough  to  run  about,  the 
temple  gardens  and  groves  serve  for  a  playground. 
School-life  does  not  separate  the  Ujiko  from  the  Uji 
gami  (unless  the  family  should  permanently  leave  the 
district) ;  the  visits  to  the  temple  are  still  continued  as 
a  duty.  Grown-up  and  married,  the  Ujiko  regularly 
visits  the  guardian-god,  accompanied  by  wife  or  hus 
band,  and  brings  the  children  to  pay  obeisance.  If 
obliged  to  make  a  long  journey,  or  to  quit  the  district 
forever,  the  Ujiko  pays  a  farewell  visit  to  the  Ujigami, 
as  well  as  to  the  tombs  of  the  family  ancestors ;  and 
on  returning  to  one's  native  place  after  prolonged 


98  THE    COMMUNAL    CULT 

absence,  the  first  visit  is  to  the  god.  ...  I  have 
more  than  once  been  touched  by  the  spectacle  of 
soldiers  at  prayer  before  lonesome  little  temples  in 
country  places,  —  soldiers  but  just  returned  from 
Korea,  China,  or  Formosa :  their  first  thought  on 
reaching  home  was  to  utter  their  thanks  to  the  god 
of  their  childhood,  whom  they  believed  to  have 
guarded  them  in  the  hour  of  battle  and  the  season 
of  pestilence. 

The  best  authority  on  the  local  customs  and  laws 
of  Old  Japan,  John  Henry  Wigmore,  remarks  that 
the  Shint5  cult  had  few  relations  with  local  adminis 
tration.  In  his  opinion  the  Ujigami  were  the  deified 
ancestors  of  certain  noble  families  of  early  times ; 
and  their  temples  continued  to  be  in  the  patronage 
of  those  families.  The  office  of  the  Shinto  priest, 
or  "god-master'*  (kannushi)  was,  and  still  is,  heredi 
tary  ;  and,  as  a  rule,  any  kannushi  can  trace  back  his 
descent  from  the  family  of  which  the  Ujigami  was 
originally  the  patron-god.  But  the  Shinto  priests, 
with  some  few  exceptions,  were  neither  magistrates 
nor  administrators  ;  and  Professor  Wigmore  thinks 
that  this  may  have  been  "  due  to  the  lack  of 
administrative  organization  within  the  cult  itself."  1 

1  The  vague  character  of  the  Shinto  hierarchy  is  probably  best  explained  by 
Mr.  Spencer  in  Chapter  VIII  of  the  third  volume  of  Principles  of  Sociology : 
"  The  establishment  of  an  ecclesiastical  organization  separate  from  the  political 
organization,  but  akin  to  it  in  its  structure,  appears  to  be  largely  determined  by  the 
rise  of  a  decided  distinction  in  thought  between  the  affairs  of  this  world  and  those  of 


THE    COMMUNAL    CULT  99 

This  would  be  an  adequate  explanation.  But  in 
spite  of  the  fact  that  they  exercised  no  civil  function, 
I  believe  it  can  be  shown  that  Shinto  priests  had, 
and  still  have,  powers  above  the  law.  Their  rela 
tion  to  the  community  was  of  an  extremely  im 
portant  kind :  their  authority  was  only  religious ; 
but  it  was  heavy  and  irresistible. 

To  understand  this,  we  must  remember  that  the 
Shinto  priest  represented  the  religious  sentiment  of 
his  district.  The  social  bond  of  each  community 
was  identical  with  the  religious  bond,  —  the  cult  of 
the  local  tutelar  god.  It  was  to  the  Ujigami  that 
prayers  were  made  for  success  in  all  communal  un 
dertakings,  for  protection  against  sickness,  for  the 
triumph  of  the  lord  in  time  of  war,  for  succour  in 
the  season  of  famine  or  epidemic.  The  Ujigami 
was  the  giver  of  all  good  things,  —  the  special  helper 
and  guardian  of  the  people.  That  this  belief  still 
prevails  may  be  verified  by  any  one  who  studies  the 
peasant-life  of  Japan.  It  is  not  to  the  Buddhas 
that  the  farmer  prays  for  bountiful  harvests,  or  for 
rain  in  time  of  drought ;  it  is  not  to  the  Buddhas 

a  supposed  other  world.  Where  the  two  are  concaved  as  existing  in  continuity,  or 
as  intimately  related,  the  organizations  appropriate  to  their  respective  administrations 
remain  either  identical  or  imperfectly  distinguished.  ...  If  the  Chinese  are 
remarkable  for  the  complete  absence  of  a  priestly  caste,  it  is  because,  along  with 
their  universal  and  active  ancestor-worship,  they  have  preserved  that  inclusion  of 
the  duties  of  priest  in  the  duties  of  ruler,  which  ancestor-worship  in  its  simple  form 
shows  us."  Mr.  Spencer  remarks  in  the  same  paragraph  on  the  fact  that  in 
ancient  Japan  "  religion  and  government  were  the  same."  A  distinct  Shinto 
hierarchy  was  therefore  never  evolved. 


joo  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

that  thanks  are  rendered  for  a  plentiful  rice-crop  — • 
but  to  the  ancient  local  god.  And  the  cult  of  the 
Ujigami  embodies  the  moral  experience  of  the  com 
munity, —  represents  all  its  cherished  traditions  and 
customs,  its  unwritten  laws  of  conduct,  its  sentiment 
of  duty.  .  .  .  Now  just  as  an  offence  against  the 
ethics  of  the  family  must,  in  such  a  society,  be  re 
garded  as  an  impiety  towards  the  family-ancestor, 
so  any  breach  of  custom  in  the  village  or  district 
must  be  considered  as  an  act  of  disrespect  to  its 
Ujigami.  The  prosperity  of  the  family  depends, 
it  is  thought,  upon  the  observance  of  filial  piety, 
which  is  identified  with  obedience  to  the  traditional 
rules  of  household  conduct ;  and,  in  like  manner, 
the  prosperity  of  the  commune  is  supposed  to  de 
pend  upon  the  observance  of  ancestral  custom,  — 
upon  obedience  to  those  unwritten  laws  of  the  dis 
trict,  which  are  taught  to  all  from  the  time  of  their 
childhood.  Customs  are  identified  with  morals. 
Any  offence  against  the  customs  of  the  settlement 
is  an  offence  against  the  gods  who  protect  it,  and 
therefore  a  menace  to  the  public  weal.  The  exist 
ence  of  the  community  is  endangered  by  the  crime 
of  any  of  its  members :  every  member  is  therefore 
held  accountable  by  the  community  for  his  conduct. 
Every  action  must  conform  to  the  traditional  usages 
of  the  Ujiko :  independent  exceptional  conduct  is  a 
public  offence. 

What  the  obligations   of  the  individual    to  the 


THE   COMMUNAL   CULT  101 

community  signified  in  ancient  times  may  therefore 
be  imagined.  He  had  certainly  no  more  right  to 
himself  than  had  the  Greek  citizen  three  thou 
sand  years  ago, — probably  not  so  much.  To-day, 
though  laws  have  been  greatly  changed,  he  is  prac 
tically  in  much  the  same  condition.  The  mere  idea 
of  the  right  to  do  as  one  pleases  (within  such  limits 
as  are  imposed  on  conduct  by  English  and  Ameri 
can  societies,  for  example)  could  not  enter  into  his 
mind.  Such  freedom,  if  explained  to  him,  he  would 
probably  consider  as  a  condition  morally  compar 
able  to  that  of  birds  and  beasts.  Among  ourselves, 
the  social  regulations  for  ordinary  people  chiefly 
settle  what  must  not  be  done.  But  what  one  must 
not  do  in  Japan — though  representing  a  very  wide 
range  of  prohibition  —  means  much  less  than  half  of 
the  common  obligation  :  what  one  must  do,  is  still 
more  necessary  to  learn.  .  .  .  Let  us  briefly  con 
sider  the  restraints  which  custom  places  upon  the 
liberty  of  the  individual. 

First  of  all,  be  it  observed  that  the  communal 
will  reinforces  the  will  of  the  household,  —  compels 
the  observance  of  filial  piety.  Even  the  conduct  of 
a  boy,  who  has  passed  the  age  of  childhood,  is  regu 
lated  not  only  by  the  family,  but  by  the  public. 
He  must  obey  the  household ;  and  he  must  also 
obey  public  opinion  in  regard  to  his  domestic  rela 
tions.  Any  marked  act  of  disrespect,  inconsistent 


102  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

with  filial  piety,  would  be  judged  and  rebuked  b) 
all.  When  old  enough  to  begin  work  or  study,  a 
lad's  daily  conduct  is  observed  and  criticised ;  and 
at  the  age  when  the  household  law  first  tightens 
about  him,  he  also  commences  to  feel  the  pressure 
of  common  opinion.  On  coming  of  age,  he  has  to 
marry ;  and  the  idea  of  permitting  him  to  choose  a 
wife  for  himself  is  quite  out  of  the  question :  he  is 
expected  to  accept  the  companion  selected  for  him. 
But  should  reasons  be  found  for  humouring  him  in 
the  event  of  an  irresistible  aversion,  then  he  must 
wait  until  another  choice  has  been  made  by  the 
family.  The  community  would  not  tolerate  insub 
ordination  in  such  matters :  one  example  of  filial 
revolt  would  constitute  too  dangerous  a  precedent. 
When  the  young  man  at  last  becomes  the  head  of  a 
household,  and  responsible  for  the  conduct  of  its 
members,  he  is  still  constrained  by  public  sentiment 
to  accept  advice  in  his  direction  of  domestic  affairs. 
He  is  not  free  to  follow  his  own  judgment,  in  cer 
tain  contingencies.  For  example,  he  is  bound  by 
custom  to  furnish  help  to  relatives  ;  and  he  is  obliged 
to  accept  arbitration  in  the  event  of  trouble  with 
them.  He  is  not  permitted  to  think  of  his  own 
wife  and  children  only, — -such  conduct  would  be 
deemed  intolerably  selfish :  he  must  be  able  to  act, 
to  outward  seeming  at  least,  as  if  uninfluenced  by 
paternal  or  marital  affection  in  his  public  conduct. 
Even  supposing  that,  later  in  life,  he  should  be 


THE    COMMUNAL   CULT  103 

appointed  to  the  position  of  village  or  district  head 
man,  his  right  of  action  and  judgment  would  be  under 
just  as  much  restriction  as  before.  Indeed,  the 
range  of  his  personal  freedom  actually  decreases 
in  proportion  to  his  ascent  in  the  social  scale. 
Nominally  he  may  rule  as  headman :  practically  his 
authority  is  only  lent  to  him  by  the  commune, 
and  it  will  remain  to  him  just  so  long  as  the  com 
mune  pleases.  For  he  is  elected  to  enforce  the  pub 
lic  will,  not  to  impose  his  own,  —  to  serve  the 
common  interests,  not  to  serve  his  own,  —  to  main 
tain  and  confirm  custom,  not  to  break  with  it. 
Thus,  though  appointed  chief,  he  is  only  the  pub 
lic  servant,  and  the  least  free  man  in  his  native  place. 
Various  documents  translated  and  published  by 
Professor  Wigmore,  in  his  "  Notes  on  Land  Tenure 
and  Local  Institutions  in  Old  Japan,"  give  a  start 
ling  idea  of  the  minute  regulation  of  communal  life 
in  country-districts  during  the  period  of  the  Toku- 
jawa  Shoguns.  Much  of  the  regulation  was  certainly 
imposed  by  higher  authority ;  but  it  is  likely  that 
a  considerable  portion  of  the  rules  represented  old 
local  custom.  Such  documents  were  called  Kumi-cho 
or  "  Kumi  ^enactments  ":  they  established  the  rules 

1  Down  to  the  close  of  the  feudal  period,  the  mass  of  the  population  throughout 
the  country,  in  the  great  cities  as  well  as  in  the  villages,  was  administratively  ordered 
by  groups  of  families,  or  rather  of  households,  called  Kami,  or  "  companies."  The 
general  number  of  households  in  a  Kumi  was  five  ;  but  there  were  in  some  provinces 
Kumi  consisting  of  six,  and  of  ten,  households.  The  heads  of  the  households 
composing  a  Kumi  elected  one  of  their  number  as  chief,  —  who  became  the  respon- 


104  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

of  conduct  to  be  observed  by  all  the  members  of  a 
village-community,  and  their  social  interest  is  very 
great.  By  personal  inquiry  I  have  learned  that  in 
various  parts  of  the  country,  rules  much  like  those 
recorded  in  the  Kumi-cho,  are  still  enforced  by  village 
custom.  I  select  a  few  examples  from  Professor 
Wigmore's  translation :  — 

"If  there  be  any  of  our  number  who  are  unkind  to 
parents,  or  neglectful  or  disobedient,  we  will  not  conceal 
it  or  condone  it,  but  will  report  it.  .  .  ." 

"  We  shall  require  children  to  respect  their  parents, 
servants  to  obey  their  masters,  husbands  and  wives  and 
brothers  and  sisters  to  live  together  in  harmony,  and  the 
younger  people  to  revere  and  to  cherish  their  elders.  .  .  . 
Each  kumi  [group  of  five  households]  shall  carefully  watch 
over  the  conduct  of  its  members,  so  as  to  prevent  wrong 
doing." 

"  If  any  member  of  a  kumi,  whether  farmer,  merchant, 
or  artizan,  is  lazy,  and  does  not  attend  properly  to  his 
business,  the  ban-gashira  [chief  officer]  will  advise  him, 
warn  him,  and  lead  him  into  better  ways.  If  the  person 
does  not  listen  to  this  advice,  and  becomes  angry  and 
obstinate,  he  is  to  be  reported  to  the  tosblyori  [village 
elder].  .  .  ." 

"When  men   who   are  quarrelsome   and    who   like   to 

sible  representative  of  all  the  members  of  the  Kumi.  The  origin  and  history  of  the 
AT«OT/-system  is  obscure  :  a  similar  system  exists  in  China  and  in  Korea.  (Professor 
Wigmore's  reasons  for  doubting  that  the  Japanese  Kami-system  had  a  military  origin, 
appear  to  be  cogent.)  Certainly  the  system  greatly  facilitated  administration.  To 
superior  authority  the  Kumi  was  responsible,  not  the  single  household. 


THE   COMMUNAL   CULT  io«> 

indulge  in  late  hours  away  from  home  will  not  listen  to 
admonition,  we  will  report  them.  If  any  other  kumi 
neglects  to  do  this,  it  will  be  part  of  our  duty  to  do  it 
for  them.  .  .  ." 

"  All  those  who  quarrel  with  their  relatives,  and  refuse 
to  listen  to  their  good  advice,  or  disobey  their  parents,  or 
are  unkind  to  their  fellow-villagers,  shall  be  reported  [to 
the  village  officers] .  .  .  ." 

"  Dancing,  wrestling,  and  other  public  shows  shall  be 
forbidden.  Singing  and  dancing-girls  and  prostitutes  shall 
not  be  allowed  to  remain  a  single  night  in  the  mura 
[village]." 

"  Quarrels  among  the  people  shall  be  forbidden.  In 
case  of  dispute  the  matter  shall  be  reported.  If  this 
is  not  done,  all  parties  shall  be  indiscriminately  pun 
ished.  .  .  ." 

"  Speaking  disgraceful  things  of  another  man,  or  publicly 
posting  him  as  a  bad  man,  even  if  he  is  so,  is  forbidden." 

"  Filial  piety  and  faithful  service  to  a  master  should  be 
a  matter  of  course ;  but  when  there  is  any  one  who  is 
especially  faithful  and  diligent  in  these  things,  we  promise 
to  report  him  .  .  .  for  recommendation  to  the  govern 
ment.  .  .  ." 

"  As  members  of  a  kumi  we  will  cultivate  friendly  feel 
ing  even  more  than  with  our  relatives,  and  will  promote 
each  other's  happiness,  as  well  as  share  each  other's  griefs. 
If  there  is  an  unprincipled  or  lawless  person  in  a  kumi,  we 
will  all  share  the  responsibility  for  him." 1 

1  "  Notes  on  Land  Tenure  and  Local  Institutions  in  Old  Japan  "  (  Transaction! 
Asiatic  Society  of  Japan,  Vol.  XIX,  Part  I).  I  have  chosen  the  quotations  from 
different  kumi-cbot  and  arranged  them  illustratively. 


106  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

The  above  are  samples  of  the  moral  regulations 
only :  there  were  even  more  minute  regulations 
about  other  duties,  —  for  instance  :  — 

"  When  a  fire  occurs,  the  people  shall  immediately  hasten 
to  the  spot,  each  bringing  a  bucketful  of  water,  and  shall 
endeavour,  under  direction  of  the  officers,  to  put  the  fire 
out.  .  .  .  Those  who  absent  themselves  shall  be  deemed 
culpable. 

"  When  a  stranger  comes  to  reside  here,  enquiries  shall 
be  made  as  to  the  mura  whence  he  came,  and  a  surety  shall 
be  furnished  by  him.  .  .  .  No  traveller  shall  lodge,  even 
for  a  single  night,  in  a  house  other  than  a  public  inn. 

"  News  of  robberies  and  night  attacks  shall  be  given  by 
the  ringing  of  bells  or  otherwise ;  and  all  who  hear  shall 
join  in  pursuit,  until  the  offender  is  taken.  Any  one  wil 
fully  refraining,  shall,  on  investigation,  be  punished." 

From  these  same  Kumi-choy  it  appears  that  no  one 
could  leave  his  village  even  for  a  single  night,  with 
out  permission,  —  or  take  service  elsewhere,  or  marry 
in  another  province,  or  settle  in  another  place.  Pun 
ishments  were  severe,  —  a  terrible  flogging  being 
the  common  mode  of  chastisement  by  the  higher 
authority.  .  .  .  To-day,  there  are  no  such  punish 
ments  ;  and,  legally,  a  man  can  go  where  he  pleases. 
But  as  a  matter  of  fact  he  can  nowhere  do  as  he 
pleases  ;  for  individual  liberty  is  still  largely  restricted 
by  the  survival  of  communal  sentiment  and  old- 
fashioned  custom.  In  any  country  community  it 
would  be  unwise  to  proclaim  such  a  doctrine  as  that 


THE   COMMUNAL   CULT  107 

a  man  has  the  right  to  employ  his  leisure  and  his 
means  as  he  may  think  proper.  No  man's  time  or 
money  or  effort  can  be  considered  exclusively  his 
own,  —  nor  even  the  body  that  his  ghost  inhabits. 
His  right  to  live  in  the  community  rests  solely  upon 
his  willingness  to  serve  the  community ;  and  who 
ever  may  need  his  help  or  sympathy  has  the  privi 
lege  of  demanding  it.  That  "  a  man's  house  is  his 
castle  "  cannot  be  asserted  in  Japan  —  except  in  the 
case  of  some  high  potentate.  No  ordinary  person 
can  shut  his  door  to  lock  out  the  rest  of  the  world. 
Everybody's  house  must  be  open  to  visitors:  to 
close  its  gates  by  day  would  be  regarded  as  an  insult 
to  the  community,  —  sickness  affording  no  excuse. 
Only  persons  in  very  great  authority  have  the  right 
of  making  themselves  inaccessible.  And  to  displease 
the  community  in  which  one  lives,  —  especially  if 
the  community  be  a  rural  one,  —  is  a  serious  matter. 
When  a  community  is  displeased,  it  acts  as  an  in 
dividual.  It  may  consist  of  five  hundred,  a  thou 
sand,  or  several  thousand  persons  ;  but  the  thinking 
of  all  is  the  thinking  of  one.  By  a  single  serious 
mistake  a  man  may  find  himself  suddenly  placed  in 
solitary  opposition  to  the  common  will,  —  isolated, 
and  most  effectively  ostracized.  The  silence  and 
the  softness  of  the  hostility  only  render  it  all  the 
more  alarming.  This  is  the  ordinary  form  of  pun 
ishment  for  a  grave  offence  against  custom  :  violence 
is  rare,  and  when  resorted  to  is  intended  (except  in 


io8  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

some  extraordinary  cases  presently  to  be  noticed)  as 
a  mere  correction,  the  punishment  of  a  blunder.  In 
certain  rough  communities,  blunders  endangering 
life  are  immediately  punished  by  physical  chastise 
ment, —  not  in  anger,  but  on  traditional  principle. 
Once  I  witnessed  at  a  fishing-settlement,  a  chastise 
ment  of  this  kind.  Men  were  killing  tunny  in  the 
surf;  the  work  was  bloody  and  dangerous ;  and  in 
the  midst  of  the  excitement,  one  of  the  fishermen 
struck  his  killing-spike  into  the  head  of  a  boy. 
Everybody  knew  that  it  was  a  pure  accident ;  but 
accidents  involving  danger  to  life  are  rudely  dealt 
with,  and  this  blunderer  was  instantly  knocked 
senseless  by  the  men  nearest  him,  —  then  dragged  out 
of  the  surf  and  flung  down  on  the  sand  to  recover 
himself  as  best  he  might.  No  word  was  said  about 
the  matter;  and  the  killing  went  on  as  before.  Young 
fishermen,  I  am  told,  are  roughly  handled  by  their 
fellows  on  board  a  ship,  in  the  case  of  any  error 
involving  risk  to  the  vessel.  But,  as  I  have  already 
observed,  only  stupidity  is  punished  in  this  fashion ; 
and  ostracism  is  much  more  dreaded  than  violence. 
There  is,  indeed,  only  one  yet  heavier  punishment 
than  ostracism  —  namely,  banishment,  either  for  a 
term  of  years  or  for  life. 

Banishment  must  in  old  feudal  times  have  been 
a  very  serious  penalty ;  it  is  a  serious  penalty  even 
to-day,  under  the  new  order  of  things.  In  former 
years  the  man  expelled  from  his  native  place  by  the 


THE   COMMUNAL   CULT  109 

communal  will  —  cast  out  from  his  home,  his  clan, 
his  occupation — found  himself  face  to  face  with 
misery  absolute.  In  another  community  there  would 
be  no  place  for  him,  unless  he  happened  to  have 
relatives  there ;  and  these  would  be  obliged  to  con 
sult  with  the  local  authorities,  and  also  with  the 
officials  of  the  fugitive's  native  place,  before  ven 
turing  to  harbour  him.  No  stranger  was  suffered 
to  settle  in  another  district  than  his  own  without 
official  permission.  Old  documents  are  extant  which 
record  the  punishments  inflicted  upon  households 
for  having  given  shelter  to  a  stranger  under  pretence 
of  relationship.  A  banished  man  was  homeless 
and  friendless.  He  might  be  a  skilled  craftsman ; 
but  the  right  to  exercise  his  craft  depended  upon 
the  consent  of  the  guild  representing  that  craft  in 
the  place  to  which  he  might  go ;  and  banished  men 
were  not  received  by  the  guilds.  He  might  try  to 
become  a  servant;  but  the  commune  in  which  he 
sought  refuge  would  question  the  right  of  any 
master  to  employ  a  fugitive  and  a  stranger.  His 
religious  connexions  could  not  serve  him  in  the 
least:  the  code  of  communal  life  was  decided  not 
by  Buddhist,  but  by  Shinto  ethics.  Since  the  gods 
of  his  birthplace  had  cast  him  out,  and  the  gods  of 
any  other  locality  had  nothing  to  do  with  his  original 
cult,  there  was  no  religious  help  for  him.  Besides, 
the  mere  fact  of  his  being  a  refugee  was  itself  proof 
that  he  must  have  offended  against  his  own  cult, 


no  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

In  any  event  no  stranger  could  look  for  sympathy 
among  strangers.  Even  now  to  take  a  wife  from 
another  province  is  condemned  by  local  opinion 
(it  was  forbidden  in  feudal  times):  one  is  still  ex 
pected  to  live,  work,  and  marry  in  the  place  where 
one  has  been  born,  —  though,  in  certain  cases,  and 
with  the  public  approval  of  one's  own  people,  adop 
tion  into  another  community  is  tolerated.  Under 
the  feudal  system  there  was  incomparably  less  like 
lihood  of  sympathy  for  the  stranger;  and  banish 
ment  signified  hunger,  solitude,  and  privation 
unspeakable.  For  be  it  remembered  that  the  legal 
existence  of  the  individual,  at  that  period,  ceased 
entirely  outside  of  his  relation  to  the  family  and 
to  the  commune.  Everybody  lived  and  worked  for 
some  household ;  every  household  for  some  clan ; 
outside  of  the  household,  and  the  related  aggregate 
of  households,  there  was  no  life  to  be  lived  —  ex 
cept  the  life  of  criminals,  beggars,  and  pariahs. 
Save  with  official  permission,  one  could  not  even 
become  a  Buddhist  monk.  The  very  outcasts  — 
such  as  the  Eta  classes  —  formed  self-governing 
communities,  with  traditions  of  their  own,  and 
would  not  voluntarily  accept  strangers.  So  the 
banished  man  was  most  often  doomed  to  become 
a  hinin,  —  one  of  that  wretched  class  of  wandering 
pariahs  who  were  officially  termed  "  not-men,"  and 
lived  by  beggary,  or  by  the  exercise  of  some  vulgar 
profession,  such  as  that  of  ambulant  musician  or 

"^Hr^     J-^._.          UA>^ 


THE   COMMUNAL  CULT  in 

mountebank.  In  more  ancient  days  a  banished 
man  could  have  sold  himself  into  slavery  ;  but  even 
this  poor  privilege  seems  to  have  been  withdrawn 
during  the  Tokugawa  era. 

We  can  scarcely  imagine  to-day  the  conditions  of 
such  banishment :  to  find  a  Western  parallel  we  must 
go  back  to  ancient  Greek  and  Roman  times  long 
preceding  the  Empire.  Banishment  then  signified 
religious  excommunication,  and  practically  expulsion 
from  all  civilized  society,  —  since  there  yet  existed 
no  idea  of  human  brotherhood,  no  conception  of  any 
claim  upon  kindness  except  the  claim  of  kinship. 
The  stranger  was  everywhere  the  enemy.  Now  in 
Japan,  as  in  the  Greek  city  of  old  time,  the  religion 
of  the  tutelar  god  has  always  been  the  religion  of  a 
group  only,  the  cult  of  a  community:  it  never  became 
even  the  religion  of  a  province.  The  higher  cults, 
on  the  other  hand,  did  not  concern  themselves  with 
the  individual :  his  religion  was  only  of  the  house 
hold  and  of  the  village  or  district;  the  cults  of 
other  households  and  districts  were  entirely  distinct ; 
one  could  belong  to  them  only  by  adoption,  and 
strangers,  as  a  rule,  were  not  adopted.  Without  a 
household  or  a  clan-cult,  the  individual  was  morally 
and  socially  dead ;  for  other  cults  and  clans  excluded 
him.  When  cast  out  by  the  domestic  cult  that  regu 
lated  his  private  life,  and  by  the  local  cult  that  or 
dered  his  life  in  relation  to  the  community,  he  simply 
ceased  to  exist  in  relation  to  human  society. 


ii2  THE  COMMUNAL  CUI/T 

How  small  were  the  chances  in  past  times  foi 
personality  to  develop  and  assert  itself  may  be 
imagined  from  the  foregoing  facts.  The  individual 
was  completely  and  pitilessly  sacrificed  to  the  com 
munity.  Even  now  the  only  safe  rule  of  conduct 
in  a  Japanese  settlement  is  to  act  in  all  things  ac 
cording  to  local  custom  ;  for  the  slightest  divergence 
from  rule  will  be  observed  with  disfavour.  Privacy 
does  not  exist ;  nothing  can  be  hidden  ;  everybody's 
vices  or  virtues  are  known  to  everybody  else.  Un 
usual  behaviour  is  judged  as  a  departure  from  the 
traditional  standard  of  conduct ;  all  oddities  are  con 
demned  as  departures  from  custom ;  and  tradition 
and  custom  still  have  the  force  of  religious  obliga 
tions.  Indeed,  they  really  are  religious  and  obliga 
tory,  not  only  by  reason  of  their  origin,  but  by 
reason  of  their  relation  also  to  the  public  cult,  which 
signifies  the  worship  of  the  past. 

It  is  therefore  easy  to  understand  why  Shint5 
never  had  a  written  code  of  morals,  and  why  its 
greatest  scholars  have  declared  that  a  moral  code 
is  unnecessary.  In  that  stage  of  religious  evolution 
which  ancestor-worship  represents,  there  can  be  no 
distinction  between  religion  and  ethics,  nor  between 
ethics  and  custom.  Government  and  religion  are 
the  same ;  custom  and  law  are  identified.  The 
ethics  of  Shinto  were  all  included  in  conformity  to 
custom.  The  traditional  rules  of  the  household, 
the  traditional  laws  of  the  commune  —  these  were 


THE    COMMUNAL   CULT  113 

the  morals  of  Shinto :  to  obey  them  was  religion ; 
to  disobey  them,  impiety.  .  .  .  And,  after  all,  the 
true  significance  of  any  religious  code,  written  or 
unwritten,  lies  in  its  expression  of  social  duty,  its 
doctrine  of  the  right  and  wrong  of  conduct,  its  em 
bodiment  of  a  people's  moral  experience.  Really 
the  difference  between  any  modern  ideal  of  conduct, 
such  as  the  English,  and  the  patriarchal  ideal,  such 
as  that  of  the  early  Greeks  or  of  the  Japanese,  would 
be  found  on  examination  to  consist  mainly  in  the 
minute  extension  of  the  older  conception  to  all 
details  of  individual  life.  Assuredly  the  religion 
of  Shint5  needed  no  written  commandment :  it  was 
taught  to  everybody  frorp  childhood  by  precept  and 
example,  and  any  person  of  ordinary  intelligence 
could  learn  it.  When  a  religion  is  capable  of  ren 
dering  it  dangerous  for  anybody  to  act  outside  of 
rules,  the  framing  of  a  code  would  be  obviously 
superfluous.  We  ourselves  have  no  written  code 
of  conduct  as  regards  the  higher  social  life,  the 
exclusive  circles  of  civilized  existence,  which  are  not 
ruled  merely  by  the  Ten  Commandments.  The 
knowledge  of  what  to  do  in  those  zones,  and  of  how 
to  do  it,  can  come  only  by  training,  by  experience, 
by  observation,  and  by  the  intuitive  recognition  of 
the  reason  of  things. 

And  now  to  return  to  the  question  of  the  authority 
of  the  Shinto  priest  as  representative  of  communal 


ii4  THE   COMMUNAL   CULT 

sentiment,  —  an  authority  which  I  believe  to  have 
been  always  very  great.  .  .  .  Striking  proof  that 
the  punishments  inflicted  by  a  community  upon  its 
erring  members  were  originally  inflicted  in  the  name 
of  the  tutelar  god  is  furnished  by  the  fact  that  mani 
festations  of  communal  displeasure  still  assume,  in 
various  country  districts,  a  religious  character.  I 
have  witnessed  such  manifestations,  and  I  am  assured 
that  they  still  occur  in  most  of  the  provinces.  But 
it  is  in  remote  country-towns  or  isolated  villages, 
where  traditions  have  remained  almost  unchanged, 
that  one  can  best  observe  these  survivals  of  antique 
custom.  In  such  places  the  conduct  of  every  resi 
dent  is  closely  watched  and  rigidly  judged  by  all  the 
rest.  Little,  however,  is  said  about  misdemeanours 
of  a  minor  sort  until  the  time  of  the  great  local 
Shinto  festival,  —  the  annual  festival  of  the  tutelar 
god.  It  is  then  that  the  community  gives  its  warn 
ings  or  inflicts  its  penalties :  this  at  least  in  the  case 
of  conduct  offensive  to  local  ethics.  The  god,  on 
the  occasion  of  this  festival,  is  supposed  to  visit  the 
dwellings  of  his  Ujiko  ;  and  his  portable  shrine,  —  a 
weighty  structure  borne  by  thirty  or  forty  men, — 
is  carried  through  the  principal  streets.  The  bearers 
are  supposed  to  act  according  to  the  will  of  the  god, 
—  to  go  whithersoever  his  divine  spirit  directs 
them.  ...  I  may  describe  the  incidents  of  the 
procession  as  I  saw  it  in  a  seacoast  village,  not  once, 
but  several  times. 


THE   COMMUNAL   CULT  115 

Before  the  procession  a  band  of  young  men  ad 
vance,  leaping  and  wildly  dancing  in  circles :  these 
young  men  clear  the  way ;  and  it  is  unsafe  to  pass 
near  them,  for  they  whirl  about  as  if  moved  by 
frenzy.  .  .  .  When  I  first  saw  such  a  band  of 
dancers,  I  could  imagine  myself  watching  some  old 
Dionysiac  revel ;  —  their  furious  gyrations  certainly 
realized  Greek  accounts  of  the  antique  sacred  frenzy. 
There  were,  indeed,  no  Greek  heads ;  but  the 
bronzed  lithe  figures,  naked  save  for  loin-cloth  and 
sandals,  and  most  sculpturesquely  muscled,  might 
well  have  inspired  some  vase-design  of  dancing 
fauns.  After  these  god-possessed  dancers  —  whose 
passage  swept  the  streets  clear,  scattering  the  crowd 
to  right  and  left  —  came  the  virgin  priestess,  white- 
robed  and  veiled,  riding  upon  a  horse,  and  followed 
by  several  mounted  priests  in  white  garments  and 
high  black  caps  of  ceremony.  Behind  them  ad 
vanced  the  ponderous  shrine,  swaying  above  the 
heads  of  its  bearers  like  a  junk  in  a  storm.  Scores 
of  brawny  arms  were  pushing  it  to  the  right ;  other 
scores  were  pushing  it  to  the  left :  behind  and  before, 
also,  there  was  furious  pulling  and  pushing ;  and  the 
roar  of  voices  uttering  invocations  made  it  impossible 
to  hear  anything  else.  By  immemorial  custom  the 
upper  stories  of  all  the  dwellings  had  been  tightly 
closed :  woe  to  the  Peeping  Tom  who  should  be 
detected,  on  such  a  day,  in  the  impious  act  of  looking 
down  upon  the  god  /  .  .  . 


n6  THE   COMMUNAL  CULT 

Now  the  shrine-bearers,  as  I  have  said,  are  sup 
posed  to  be  moved  by  the  spirit  of  the  god — - 
(probably  by  his  Rough  Spirit;  for  the  Shinto  god 
is  multiple) ;  and  all  this  pushing  and  pulling  and 
swaying  signifies  only  the  deity's  inspection  of  the 
dwellings  on  either  hand.  He  is  looking  about  to 
see  whether  the  hearts  of  his  worshippers  are  pure, 
and  is  deciding  whether  it  will  be  necessary  to  give 
a  warning,  or  to  inflict  a  penalty.  His  bearers  will 
carry  him  whithersoever  he  chooses  to  go  —  through 
solid  walls  if  necessary.  If  the  shrine  strike  against 
any  house,  —  even  against  an  awning  only,  —  that  is 
a  sign  that  the  god  is  not  pleased  with  the  dwellers 
in  that  house.  If  the  shrine  breaks  part  of  the 
house,  that  is  a  serious  warning.  But  it  may  hap 
pen  that  the  god  wills  to  enter  a  house,  —  breaking 
his  way.  Then  woe  to  the  inmates,  unless  they 
flee  at  once  through  the  back-door ;  and  the  wild 
procession,  thundering  in,  will  wreck  and  rend  and 
smash  and  splinter  everything  on  the  premises  be 
fore  the  god  consents  to  proceeti  upftn  his -round* 

Upon  enquiring  into  the  reasons  of  two  wreck 
ings  of  which  I  witnessed  the  results,  I  learned 
enough  to  assure  me  that  from  the  communal  point 
of  view,  both  aggressions  were  morally  justifiable. 
In  one  case  a  fraud  had  been  practised ;  in  the 
other,  help  had  been  refused  to  the  family  of  a 
drowned  resident.  Thus  one  offence  had  been 
legal ;  the  other  only  moral.  A  country  commu- 


THE   COMMUNAL   CULT  117 

nity  will  not  hand-  over  its  delinquents  to  the  police 
except  in  case  of  incendiarism,  murder,  theft,  or 
other  serious  crime.  It  has  a  horror  of  law,  and 
never  invokes  it  when  the  matter  can  be  settled  by 
any  other  means.  This  was  the  rule  also  in  ancient 
times,  and  the  feudal  government  encouraged  its 
maintenance.  But  when  the  tutelar  deity  has  been 
displeased,  he  insists  upon  the  punishment  or  dis 
grace  of  the  offender;  and  the  offender's  entire 
family,  as  by  feudal  custom,  is  held  responsible. 
The  victim  can  invoke  the  new  law,  if  he  dares,  and 
bring  the  wreckers  of  his  home  into  court,  and 
recover  damages,  for  the  modern  police-courts  are 
not  ruled  by  Shint5.  But  only  a  very  rash  man 
will  invoke  the  new  law  against  the  communal  judg 
ment,  for  that  action  in  itself  would  be  condemned 
as  a  gross  breach  of  custom.  The  community  is 
always  ready,  through  its  council,  to  do  justice  in 
cases  where  innocence  can  be  proved.  But  if  a  man 
really  guilty  of  the  faults  charged  to  his  account 
should  try  to  avenge  himself  by  appeal  to  a  non- 
religious  law,  then  it  were  well  for  him  to  remove 
himself  and  his  family,  as  soon  as  possible  there 
after,  to  some  far-away  place. 

We  have  seen  that,  in  Old  Japan,  the  life  of  the 
individual  was  under  two  kinds  of  religious  control. 
All  his  acts  were  regulated  according  to  the  tradi 
tions  either  of  the  domestic  or  of  the  communal 


118  THE   COMMUNAL  CULT 

cult ;  and  these  conditions  probably  began  with  the 
establishment  of  a  settled  civilization.  We  have 
also  seen  that  the  communal  religion  took  upon 
itself  to  enforce  the  observance  of  the  household 
religion.  The  fact  will  not  seem  strange  if  we 
remember  that  the  underlying  idea  in  either  cult  was 
the  same,  —  the  idea  that  the  welfare  of  the  living 
depended  upon  the  welfare  of  the  dead.  Neglect 
of  the  household  rite  would  provoke,  it  was  be 
lieved,  the  malevolence  of  the  spirits  ;  and  their 
malevolence  might  bring  about  some  public  mis 
fortune.  The  ghosts  of  the  ancestors  controlled 
nature ;  —  fire  and  flood,  pestilence  and  famine  were 
at  their  disposal  as  means  of  vengeance.  One  act 
of  impiety  in  a  village  might,  therefore,  bring  about 
misfortune  to  all.  And  the  community  considered 
itself  responsible  to  the  dead  for  the  maintenance  of 
filial  piety  in  every  home. 


Developments  of  Shinto 


Developments  of  Shinto 

THE  teaching  of  Herbert  Spencer  that  the 
greater  gods  of  a  people — those  figuring  in 
popular  imagination  as  creators,  or  as  partic 
ularly  directing  certain  elemental  forces  —  represent 
a  later  development  of  ancestor-worship,  is  gener 
ally  accepted  to-day.  Ancestral  ghosts,  considered 
as  more  or  less  alike  in  the  time  when  primitive 
society  had  not  yet  developed  class  distinctions  of 
any  important  character,  subsequently  become  dif 
ferentiated,  as  the  society  itself  differentiates,  into 
greater  and  lesser.  Eventually  the  worship  of  some 
one  ancestral  spirit,  or  group  of  spirits,  overshadows 
that  of  all  the  rest ;  and  a  supreme  deity,  or  group 
of  supreme  deities,  becomes  evolved.  But  the  dif 
ferentiations  of  the  ancestor-cult  must  be  understood 
to  proceed  in  a  great  variety  of  directions.  Particu 
lar  ancestors  of  families  engaged  in  hereditary  occu 
pations  may  develop  into  tutelar  deities  presiding 
over  those  occupations  —  patron  gods  of  crafts  and 
guilds.  Out  of  other  ancestral  cults,  through  vari 
ous  processes  of  mental  association,  may  be  evolved 
the  worship  of  deities  of  strength,  of  health,  of  long 
life,  of  particular  products,  of  particular  localities. 

121 


122  DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO 

When  more  light  shall  have  been  thrown  upon  the 
question  of  Japanese  origins,  it  will  probably  be 
found  that  many  of  the  lesser  tutelar  or  patron  gods 
now  worshipped  in  the  country  were  originally  the 
gods  of  Chinese  or  Korean  craftsmen ;  but  I  think 
that  Japanese  mythology,  as  a  whole,  will  prove  to 
offer  few  important  exceptions  to  the  evolutional 
law.  Indeed,  Shint5  presents  us  with  a  mytho 
logical  hierarchy  of  which  the  development  can  be 
satisfactorily  explained  by  that  law  alone. 

Besides  the  Ujigami,  there  are  myriads  of  supe 
rior  and  of  inferior  deities.  There  are  the  primal 
deities,  of  whom  only  the  names  are  mentioned,  — 
apparitions  of  the  period  of  chaos ;  and  there  are 
the  gods  of  creation,  who  gave  shape  to  the  land. 
There  are  the  gods  of  earth  and  sky,  and  the  gods 
of  the  sun  and  moon.  Also  there  are  gods,  beyond 
counting,  supposed  to  preside  over  all  things  good 
or  evil  in  human,  life,  —  birth  and  marriage  and 
death,  riches  and  poverty,  strength  and  disease.  .  .  . 
It  can  scarcely  be  supposed  that  all  this  mythology 
was  developed  out  of  the  old  ancestor-cult  in  Japan 
itself:  more  probably  its  evolution  began  on  the 
Asiatic  continent.  But  the  evolution  of  the  national 
cult  —  that  form  of  Shint5  which  became  the 
state  religion  —  seems  to  have  been  Japanese,  in 
the  strict  meaning  of  the  word.  This  cult  is  the 
worship  of  the  gods  from  whom  the  emperors  claim 
descent,  —  the  worship  of  the  "imperial  ancestors/ 


DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO          123 

It  appears  that  the  early  emperors  of  Japan  —  the 
"  heavenly  sovereigns,"  as  they  are  called  in  the  old 
records  —  were  not  emperors  at  all  in  the  true 
meaning  of  the  term,  and  did  not  even  exercise 
universal  authority.  They  were  only  the  chiefs  of 
the  most  powerful  clan,  or  Uji,  and  their  special 
ancestor-cult  had  probably  in  that  time  no  dominant 
influence.  But  eventually,  when  the  chiefs  of  this 
great  clan  really  became  supreme  rulers  of  the  land, 
their  clan-cult  spread  everywhere,  and  overshad 
owed,  without  abolishing,  all  the  other  cults.  Then 
arose  the  national  mythology. 

We  therefore  see  that  the  course  of  Japanese 
ancestor-worship,  like  that  of  Aryan  ancestor-wor 
ship,  exhibits  those  three  successive  stages  of  devel 
opment  before  mentioned.  It  may  be  assumed  that 
on  coming  from  the  continent  to  their  present  island- 
home,  the  race  brought  with  them  a  rude  form  of 
ancestor-worship,  consisting  of  little  more  than  rites 
and  sacrifices  performed  at  the  graves  of  the  dead. 
When  the  land  had  been  portioned  out  among  the 
various  clans,  each  of  which  had  its  own  ancestor- 
cult,  all  the  people  of  the  district  belonging  to  any 
particular  clan  would  eventually  adopt  the  religion 
of  the  clan  ancestor ;  and  thus  arose  the  thousand 
cults  of  the  Ujigami.  Still  later,  the  special  cult  of 
the  most  powerful  clan  developed  into  a  national 
religion,  —  the  worship  of  the  goddess  of  the  sun, 


124  DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO 

from  whom  the  supreme  ruler  claimed  descent. 
Then,  under  Chinese  influence,  the  domestic  form 
of  ancestor-worship  was  established  in  lieu  of  the 
primitive  family-cult :  thereafter  offerings  and  pray 
ers  were  made  regularly  in  the  home,  where  the 
ancestral  tablets  represented  the  tombs  of  the  family 
dead.  But  offerings  were  still  made,  on  special 
occasions,  at  the  graves ;  and  the  three  Shinto  forms 
of  the  cult,  together  with  later  forms  of  Buddhist 
introduction,  continued  to  exist ;  and  they  rule  the 
life  of  the  nation  to-day. 

It  was  the  cult  of  the  supreme  ruler  that  first 
gave  to  the  people  a  written  account  of  traditional 
beliefs.  The  mythology  of  the  reigning  house  fur 
nished  the  scriptures  of  Shinto,  and  established  ideas 
linking  together  all  the  existing  forms  of  ancestor- 
worship.  All  Shinto  traditions  were  by  these  writ 
ings  blended  into  one  mythological  history, — ex 
plained  upon  the  basis  of  one  legend.  The  whole 
mythology  is  contained  in  two  books,  of  which 
English  translations  have  been  made.  The  oldest 
is  entitled  Ko-ji-ki,  or  "  Records  of  Ancient  Mat 
ters";  and  it  is  supposed  to  have  been  compiled  in 
the  year  712  A.D.  The  other  and  much  larger  work 
is  called  Nihongi,  "Chronicles  of  Nihon  [Japan]/' 
and  dates  from  about  720  A.D.  Both  works  profess 
to  be  histories  ;  but  a  large  portion  of  them  is  myth 
ological,  and  either  begins  with  a  story  of  creation. 


DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO  125 

They  were  compiled,  mostly,  from  oral  tradition  we 
are  told,  by  imperial  order.  It  is  said  that  a  yet 
earlier  work,  dating  from  the  seventh  century,  may 
have  been  drawn  upon  ;  but  this  has  been  lost.  No 
great  antiquity  can,  therefore,  be  claimed  for  the 
texts  as  they  stand ;  but  they  contain  traditions 
which  must  be  very  much  older,  —  possibly  thou 
sands  of  years  older.  The  Ko-ji-ki  is  said  to  have 
been  written  from  the  dictation  of  an  old  man  of 
marvellous  memory ;  and  the  Shint5  theologian 
Hirata  would  have  us  believe  that  traditions  thus 
preserved  are  especially  trustworthy.  <c  It  is  prob 
able,"  he  wrote,  "  that  those  ancient  traditions,  pre 
served  for  us  by  exercise  of  memory,  have  for  that 
very  reason  come  down  to  us  in  greater  detail  than 
if  they  had  been  recorded  in  documents.  Besides, 
men  must  have  had  much  stronger  memories  in  the 
days  before  they  acquired  the  habit  of  trusting  to 
written  characters  for  facts  which  they  wished  to 
remember,  —  as  is  shown  at  the  present  time  in  the 
case  of  the  illiterate,  who  have  to  depend  on  memory 
alone."  We  must  smile  at  Hirata's  good  faith  in 
the  changelessness  of  oral  tradition ;  but  I  believe 
that  folk-lorists  would  discover  in  the  character  of 
the  older  myths,  intrinsic  evidence  of  immense  an 
tiquity.  Chinese  influence  is  discernible  in  both 
works  ;  yet  certain  parts  have  a  particular  quality 
not  to  be  found,  I  imagine,  in  anything  Chinese,  — 
a  primeval  artlessness,  a  weirdness,  and  a  strangeness 


126          DEVELOPMENTS   OF  SHINTO 

having  nothing  in  common  with  other  mythical  lit 
erature.  For  example,  we  have,  in  the  story  of 
Izanagi,  the  world-maker,  visiting  the  shades  to 
recall  his  dead  spouse,  a  myth  that  seems  to  be 
purely  Japanese.  The  archaic  naivete  of  the  recital 
must  impress  anybody  who  studies  the  literal  trans 
lation.  I  shall  present  only  the  substance  of  the 
legend,  which  has  been  recorded  in  a  number  of 
different  versions  : l  — 

When  the  time  came  for  the  Fire-god,  Kagu- 
Tsuchi,  to  be  born,  his  mother,  Izanami-no-Mikoto, 
was  burnt,  and  suffered  change,  and  departed. 
Then  Izanagi-no-Mikoto  was  wroth  and  said,  "  Oh ! 
that  I  should  have  given  my  loved  younger  sister 
in  exchange  for  a  single  child !  "  He  crawled  at 
her  head  and  he  crawled  at  her  feet,  weeping  and 
lamenting  ;  and  the  tears  which  he  shed  fell  down 
and  became  a  deity.  .  .  .  Thereafter  Izanagi-no- 
Mikoto  went  after  Izanami-no-Mikoto  into  the 
Land  of  Yomi,  the  world  of  the  dead.  Then  Iza 
nami-no-Mikoto,  appearing  still  as  she  was  when 
alive,  lifted  the  curtain  of  the  palace  (of  the  dead), 
and  came  forth  to  meet  him ;  and  they  talked  to 
gether.  And  Izanagi-no-Mikoto  said  to  her :  "  I 
have  come  because  I  sorrowed  for  thee,  my  lovely 
younger  sister.  O  my  lovely  younger  sister,  the 
lands  that  I  and  thou  were  making  together  are  not 

1  See  for  these  different  versions  Aston' s  translation  of  the  NiAongi,  Vol  I, 


DEVELOPMENTS   OF  SHINTO          127 

yet  finished  ;  therefore  come  back  !  "  Then  Iza- 
nami-no-Mikoto  made  answer,  saying,  "  My  august 
lord  and  husband,  lamentable  it  is  that  thou  didst 
not  come  sooner,  —  for  now  I  have  eaten  of  the 
cooking-range  of  Yomi.  Nevertheless,  as  I  am 
thus  delightfully  honoured  by  thine  entry  here,  my 
lovely  elder  brother,  I  wish  to  return  with  thee  to 
the  living  world.  Now  I  go  to  discuss  the  matter 
with  the  gods  of  Yomi.  Wait  thou  here,  and  look 
not  upon  me."  So  having  spoken,  she  went  back ; 
and  Izanagi  waited  for  her.  But  she  tarried  so  long 
within  that  he  became  impatient.  Then,  taking 
the  wooden  comb  that  he  wore  in  the  left  bunch  of 
his  hair,  he  broke  off  a  tooth  from  one  end  of  the 
comb  and  lighted  it,  and  went  in  to  look  for  Iza- 
nami-no-Mikoto.  But  he  saw  her  lying  swollen  and 
festering  among  worms ;  and  eight  kinds  of  Thun 
der-Gods  sat  upon  her.  .  .  .  And  Izanagi,  being 
overawed  by  that  sight,  would  have  fled  away ;  but 
Izanami  rose  up,  crying:  "Thou  hast  put  me  to 
shame !  Why  didst  thou  not  observe  that  which  I 
charged  thee  ?  .  .  .  Thou  hast  seen  my  nakedness  ; 
now  I  will  see  thine!"  And  she  bade  the  Ugly 
Females  of  Yomi  to  follow  after  him,  and  slay  him ; 
and  the  eight  Thunders  also  pursued  him,  and 
Izanami  herself  pursued  him.  .  .  .  Then  Izanagi- 
no-Mikoto  drew  his  sword,  and  flourished  it  behind 
him  as  he  ran.  But  they  followed  close  upon  him. 
He  took  off  his  black  headdress  and  flung  it  down; 


128  DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO 

and  it  became  changed  into  grapes ;  and  while  the 
Ugly  Ones  were  eating  the  grapes,  he  gained  upon 
them.  But  they  followed  quickly ;  and  he  then 
took  his  comb  and  cast  it  down,  and  it  became 
changed  into  bamboo  sprouts ;  and  while  the  Ugly 
Ones  were  devouring  the  sprouts,  he  fled  on  until 
he  reached  the  mouth  of  Yomi.  Then  taking  a 
rock  which  it  would  have  required  the  strength  of 
a  thousand  men  to  lift,  he  blocked  therewith  the 
entrance  as  Izanami  came  up.  And  standing  be 
hind  the  rock,  he  began  to  pronounce  the  words 
of  divorce.  Then,  from  the  other  side  of  the  rock, 
Izanami  cried  out  to  him,  "  My  dear  lord  and 
master,  if  thou  dost  so,  in  one  day  will  I  strangle 
to  death  a  thousand  of  thy  people!"  And  Izanagi- 
no-Mikoto  answered  her,  saying,  "  My  beloved 
younger  sister,  if  thou  dost  so,  I  will  cause  in  one 
day  to  be  born  fifteen  hundred.  .  .  ."  But  the 
deity  Kukuri-hime-no-Kami  then  came,  and  spake 
to  Izanami  some  word  which  she  seemed  to  approve, 
and  thereafter  she  vanished  away.  .  .  . 

The  strange  mingling  of  pathos  with  nightmare- 
terror  in  this  myth,  of  which  I  have  not  ventured  to 
present  all  the  startling  naivete,  sufficiently  proves  its 
primitive  character.  It  is  a  dream  that  some  one 
really  dreamed,  —  one  of  those  bad  dreams  in  which 
the  figure  of  a  person  beloved  becomes  horribly 
transformed ;  and  it  has  a  particular  interest  as 


DEVELOPMENTS    OF    SHINTO  129 

expressing  that  fear  of  death  and  of  the  dead 
informing  all  primitive  ancestor-worship.  The 
whole  pathos  and  weirdness  of  the  myth,  the 
vague  monstrosity  of  the  fancies,  the  formal  use  of 
terms  of  endearment  in  the  moment  of  uttermost 
loathing  and  fear,  —  all  impress  one  as  unmistakably 
Japanese.  Several  other  myths  scarcely  less  remark 
able  are  to  be  found  in  the  Ko-ji-ki  and  Nihongi ; 
but  they  are  mingled  with  legends  of  so  light  and 
graceful  a  kind  that  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  believe 
these  latter  to  have  been  imagined  by  the  same  race. 
The  story  of  the  magical  jewels  and  the  visit  to  the 
sea-god's  palace,  for  example,  in  the  second  book  of 
the  Nihongi)  sounds  oddly  like  an  Indian  fairy-tale; 
and  it  is  not  unlikely  that  the  Ko-ji-ki  and  Nihongi 
both  contain  myths  derived  from  various  alien 
sources.  At  all  events  their  mythical  chapters  pre 
sent  us  with  some  curious  problems  which  yet 
remain  unsolved.  Otherwise  the  books  are  dull 
reading,  in  spite  of  the  light  which  they  shed  upon 
ancient  customs  and  beliefs ;  and,  generally  speak 
ing,  Japanese  mythology  is  unattractive.  But  to 
dwell  here  upon  the  mythology,  at  any  length,  is 
unnecessary ;  for  its  relation  to  Shinto  can  be 
summed  up  in  the  space  of  a  single  brief  para 
graph  :  — 

In  the  beginning  neither  force  nor  form  was  mani 
fest;  and  the  world  was  a  shapeless  mass  that  floated 


130  DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO 

Jike  a  jelly-fish  upon  water.  Then,  in  some  way  — 
we  are  not  told  how  —  earth  and  heaven  became 
separated ;  dim  gods  appeared  and  disappeared ; 
and  at  last  there  came  into  existence  a  male  and  a 
female  deity,  who  gave  birth  and  shape  to  things. 
By  this  pair,  Izanagi  and  Izanami,  were  produced 
the  islands  of  Japan,  and  the  generations  of  the 
gods,  and  the  deities  of  the  Sun  and  Moon.  The 
descendants  of  these  creating  deities,  and  of  the  gods 
whom  they  brought  into  being,  were  the  eight  thou 
sand  (or  eighty  thousand)  myriads  of  gods  wor 
shipped  by  Shinto.  Some  went  to  dwell  in  the 
blue  Plain  of  High  Heaven ;  others  remained  on 
earth  and  became  the  ancestors  of  the  Japanese 
race. 

Such  is  the  mythology  of  the  Ko-ji-ki  and  the 
Nihongi)  stated  in  the  briefest  possible  way.  At 
first  it  appears  that  there  were  two  classes  of  gods 
recognized :  Celestial  and  Terrestrial ;  and  the  old 
Shinto  rituals  (norito)  maintain  this  distinction.  But 
it  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  celestial  gods  of  this 
mythology  do  not  represent  celestial  forces ;  and 
that  the  gods  who  are  really  identified  with  celestial 
phenomena  are  classed  as  terrestrial  gods,  —  having 
been  born  or  "produced"  upon  earth.  The  Sun 
and  Moon,  for  example,  are  said  to  have  been  born 
in  Japan,  —  though  afterwards  placed  in  heaven ; 
the  Sun-goddess,  Ama-terasu-no-oho-Kami,  having 
been  produced  from  the  left  eye  of  Izanagi,  and  the 


DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO          131 

Moon-god,  Tsuki-yomi-no-Mikoto,  having  been 
produced  from  the  right  eye  of  Izanagi  when,  after 
his  visit  to  the  under-world,  he  washed  himself  at  the 
mouth  of  a  river  in  the  island  of  Tsukushi.  The 
Shinto  scholars  of  the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  cen 
turies  established  some  order  in  this  chaos  of  fancies 
by  denying  all  distinction  between  the  Celestial  and 
Terrestrial  gods,  except  as  regarded  the  accident  of 
birth.  They  also  denied  the  old  distinction  between 
the  so-called  Age  of  the  Gods  (Kami-yo),  and  the 
subsequent  period  of  the  Emperors.  It  was  true, 
they  said,  that  the  early  rulers  of  Japan  were  gods ; 
but  so  were  also  the  later  rulers.  The  whole 
Imperial  line,  the  "  Sun's  Succession,"  represented 
one  unbroken  descent  from  the  Goddess  of  the  Sun. 
Hirata  wrote :  "  There  exists  no  hard  and  fast  line 
between  the  Age  of  the  Gods  and  the  present  age ; 
and  there  exists  no  justification  whatever  for  drawing 
one,  as  the  Nihongi  does."  Of  course  this  position 
involved  the  doctrine  of  a  divine  descent  for  the 
whole  race,  —  inasmuch  as,  according  to  the  old 
mythology,  the  first  Japanese  were  all  descendants 
of  gods,  —  and  that  doctrine  Hirata  boldly  accepted. 
All  the  Japanese,  he  averred,  were  of  divine  origin, 
and  for  that  reason  superior  to  the  people  of  all  other 
countries.  He  even  held  that  their  divine  descent 
could  be  proved  without  difficulty.  These  are  his 
words :  "  The  descendants  of  the  gods  who  accom 
panied  Ninigi-no-Mikoto  [grandson  of  the  Sun-god- 


i32  DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO 

de  ss,  and  supposed  founder  of  the  Imperial  house  ^\  —  as 
well  as  the  offspring  of  the  successive  Mikados,  who 
entered  the  ranks  of  the  subjects  of  the  Mikados, 
with  the  names  of  Taira,  Minamoto,  and  so  forth,  — 
have  gradually  increased  and  multiplied.  Although 
numbers  of  Japanese  cannot  state  with  certainty  from 
what  gods  they  are  descended,  all  of  them  have  tribal 
names  (kabane\  which  were  originally  bestowed  on 
them  by  the  Mikados ;  and  those  who  make  it  their 
province  to  study  genealogies  can  tell  from  a  man's 
ordinary  surname,  who  his  remotest  ancestor  must 
have  been."  All  the  Japanese  were  gods  in  this 
sense ;  and  their  country  was  properly  called  the 
Land  of  the  Gods,  —  Shinkoku  or  Kami-no-kuni. 
Are  we  to  understand  Hirata  literally  ?  I  think 
so  —  but  we  must  remember  that  there  existed  in 
feudal  times  large  classes  of  people,  outside  of  the 
classes  officially  recognized  as  forming  the  nation, 
who  were  not  counted  as  Japanese,  nor  even  as 
human  beings :  these  were  pariahs,  and  reckoned 
as  little  better  than  animals.  Hirata  probably 
referred  to  the  four  great  classes  only  —  samurai, 
farmers,  artizans,  and  merchants.  But  even  in  that 
case  what  are  we  to  think  of  his  ascription  of  divin 
ity  to  the  race,  in  view  of  the  moral  and  physical 
feebleness  of  human  nature  ?  The  moral  side  of  the 
question  is  answered  by  the  Shinto  theory  of  evil 
deities,  cc  gods  of  crookedness,"  who  were  alleged  to 
have  "  originated  from  the  impurities  contracted  by 


DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO          133 

Izanagi  during  his  visit  to  the  under-world/'  As 
for  the  physical  weakness  of  men,  that  is  explained 
by  a  legend  of  Ninigi-no-Mikoto,  divine  founder 
of  the  imperial  house.  The  Goddess  of  Long  Life, 
Iha-naga-hime  (Rock-long-princess),  was  sent  to  him 
for  wife ;  but  he  rejected  her  because  of  her  ugli 
ness  ;  and  that  unwise  proceeding  brought  about 
"  the  present  shortness  of  the  lives  of  men."  Most 
mythologies  ascribe  vast  duration  to  the  lives  of  early 
patriarchs  or  rulers  :  the  farther  we  go  back  into 
mythological  history,  the  longer-lived  are  the  sover 
eigns.  To  this  general  rule  Japanese  mythology  pre 
sents  no  exception.  The  son  of  Ninigi-no-Mikoto  is 
said  to  have  lived  five  hundred  and  eighty  years  at 
his  palace  of  Takachiho  ;  but  that,  remarks  Hirata, 
"  was  a  short  life  compared  with  the  lives  of  those 
who  lived  before  him."  Thereafter  men's  bodies 
declined  in  force ;  life  gradually  became  shorter  and 
shorter ;  yet  in  spite  of  all  degeneration  the  Japan 
ese  still  show  traces  of  their  divine  origin.  After 
death  they  enter  into  a  higher  divine  condition, 
without,  however,  abandoning  this  world.  .  .  .  Such 
were  Hirata's  views.  Accepting  the  Shint5  theory 
of  origins,  this  ascription  of  divinity  to  human  nature 
proves  less  inconsistent  than  it  appears  at  first  sight ; 
and  the  modern  Shintoist  may  discover  a  germ  of 
scientific  truth  in  the  doctrine  which  traces  back  the 
beginnings  of  life  to  the  Sun. 


134          DEVELOPMENTS   OF  SHINTO 

More  than  any  other  Japanese  writer,  Hirata  has 
enabled  us  to  understand  the  hierarchy  of  Shinto 
mythology,  —  corresponding  closely,  as  we  might 
have  expected,  to  the  ancient  ordination  of  Japanese 
society.  In  the  lowermost  ranks  are  the  spirits  of 
common  people,  worshipped  only  at  the  household 
shrine  or  at  graves.  Above  these  are  the  gentile 
gods  or  Ujigami,  —  ghosts  of  old  rulers  now  wor 
shipped  as  tutelar  gods.  All  Ujigami,  Hirata  tells 
us,  are  under  the  control  of  the  Great  God  of  Izumo, 
—  Oho-kuni-nushi-no-Kami,  —  and,  "acting  as  his 
agents,  they  rule  the  fortunes  of  human  beings  be 
fore  their  birth,  during  their  life,  and  after  their 
death."  This  means  that  the  ordinary  ghosts  obey, 
in  the  world  invisible,  the  commands  of  the  clan- 
gods  or  tutelar  deities ;  that  the  conditions  of  com 
munal  worship  during  life  continue  after  death. 
The  following  extract  from  Hirata  will  be  found  of 
interest,  —  not  only  as  showing  the  supposed  rela 
tion  of  the  individual  to  the  Ujigami,  but  also  as 
suggesting  how  the  act  of  abandoning  one's  birth 
place  was  formerly  judged  by  common  opinion  :  — 

"  When  a  person  removes  his  residence,  his  original 
Ujigami  has  to  make  arrangements  with  the  Ujigami  of  the 
place  whither  he  transfers  his  abode.  On  such  occasions 
it  is  proper  to  take  leave  of  the  old  god,  and  to  pay  a  visit 
to  the  temple  of  the  new  god  as  soon  as  possible  after 
coming  within  his  jurisdiction.  The  apparent  reasons 
which  a  man  imagines  to  have  induced  him  to  change  his 


DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO          135 

abode  may  be  many ;  but  the  real  reasons  cannot  be  otherwise 
than  that  either  he  has  offended  his  Ujigami,  and  is  therefore 
expelled^  or  that  the  Ujigami  of  another  place  has  negotiated  his 
transfer.  .  .  ."  * 

It  would  thus  appear  that  every  person  was  sup 
posed  to  be  the  subject,  servant,  or  retainer  of  some 
Ujigami,  both  during  life  and  after  death. 

There  were,  of  course,  various  grades  of  these 
clan-gods,  just  as  there  were  various  grades  of  living 
rulers,  lords  of  the  soil.  Above  ordinary  Ujigami 
ranked  the  deities  worshipped  in  the  chief  Shinto 
temples  of  the  various  provinces,  which  temples 
were  termed  Ichi-no-miya,  or  temples  of  the  first 
grade.  These  deities  appear  to  have  been  in  many 
cases  spirits  of  princes  or  greater  daimyo,  formerly 
ruling  extensive  districts  ;  but  all  were  not  of  this 
category.  Among  them  were  deities  of  elements  or 
elemental  forces,  —  Wind,  Fire,  and  Sea,  —  deities 
also  of  longevity,  of  destiny,  and  of  harvests,  —  clan- 
gods,  perhaps,  originally,  though  their  real  history 
had  been  long  forgotten.  But  above  all  other 
Shint5  divinities  ranked  the  gods  of  the  Imperial 
Cult,  —  the  supposed  ancestors  of  the  Mikados. 

Of  the  higher  forms  of  Shinto  worship,  that  of 
the  imperial  ancestors  proper  is  the  most  important, 
being  the  State  cult;  but  it  is  not  the  oldest. 
There  are  two  supreme  cults  :  that  of  the  Sun-god- 

1  Translated  by  Satow.     The  italics  are  mine. 


136  DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO 

dess,  represented  by  the  famous  shrines  of  Ise ;  and 
the  Izumo  cult,  represented  by  the  great  temple  of 
Kitzuki.  This  Izumo  temple  is  the  centre  of  the 
more  ancient  cult.  It  is  dedicated  to  Oho-kuni- 
nushi-no-Kami,  first  ruler  of  the  Province  of  the 
Gods,  and  offspring  of  the  brother  of  the  Sun-god 
dess.  Dispossessed  of  his  realm  in  favour  of  the 
founder  of  the  imperial  dynasty,  Oho-kuni-nushi- 
no-Kami  became  the  ruler  of  the  Unseen  World, 
—  that  is  to  say  the  World  of  Ghosts.  Unto  his 
shadowy  dominion  the  spirits  of  all  men  proceed 
after  death  ;  and  he  rules  over  all  of  the  Ujigami. 
We  may  therefore  term  him  the  Emperor  of  the 
Dead.  "You  cannot  hope,"  Hirata  says,  "to  live 
more  than  a  hundred  years,  under  the  most  favour 
able  circumstances ;  but  as  you  will  go  to  the  Un 
seen  Realm  of  Oho-kuni-nushi-no-Kami  after  death, 
and  be  subject  to  him,  learn  betimes  to  bow  down 
before  him."  .  .  .  That  weird  fancy  expressed  in 
the  wonderful  fragment  by  Coleridge,  "  The  Wan 
derings  of  Cain,"  would  therefore  seem  to  have 
actually  formed  an  article  of  ancient  Shinto  faith : 
"  The  Lord  is  God  of  the  living  only :  the  dead  have 
another  God."  .  .  . 

The  God  of  the  Living  in  Old  Japan  was,  of 
course,  the  Mikado,  —  the  deity  incarnate,  Arahito- 
gami,  —  and  his  palace  was  the  national  sanctuary, 
the  Holy  of  Holies.  Within  the  precincts  of  that 


DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO  137 

palace  was  the  Kashiko-Dokoro  ("  Place  of  Awe  "), 
the  private  shrine  of  the  Imperial  Ancestors,  where 
only  the  court  could  worship,  —  the  public  form  of 
the  same  cult  being  maintained  at  Ise.  But  the 
Imperial  House  worshipped  also  by  deputy  (and 
still  so  worships)  both  at  Kitzuki  and  Ise,  and  like 
wise  at  various  other  great  sanctuaries.  Formerly  a 
great  number  of  temples  were  maintained,  or  partly 
maintained,  from  the  imperial  revenues.  All  Shinto 
temples  of  importance  used  to  be  classed  as  greater 
and  lesser  shrines.  There  were  304  of  the  first 
rank,  and  2828  of  the  second  rank.  But  multi 
tudes  of  temples  were  not  included  in  this  official 
classification,  and  depended  upon  local  support. 
The  recorded  total  of  Shinto  shrines  to-day  is 
upwards  of  195,000. 

We  have  thus  —  without  counting  the  great 
Izumo  cult  of  Oho-kuni-nushi-no-Kami  —  four 
classes  of  ancestor-worship :  the  domestic  religion, 
the  religion  of  the  Ujigami,  the  worship  at  the  chief 
shrines  \_Ichi-no-miy a\  of  the  several  provinces,  and 
the  national  cult  at  Ise.  All  these  cults  are  now 
linked  together  by  tradition ;  and  the  devout  Shin- 
tdist  worships  the  divinities  of  all,  collectively,  in 
his  daily  morning  prayer.  Occasionally  he  visits 
the  chief  shrine  of  his  province ;  and  he  makes  a 
pilgrimage  to  Ise  if  he  can.  Every  Japanese  is 
expected  to  visit  the  shrines  of  Ise  once  in  his  life- 


138  DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO 

time,  or  to  send  thither  a  deputy.  Inhabitants  ot 
remote  districts  are  not  all  able,  of  course,  to  make 
the  pilgrimage ;  but  there  is  no  village  which  does 
not,  at  certain  intervals,  send  pilgrims  either  to 
Kitzuki  or  to  Ise  on  behalf  of  the  community,  — 
the  expense  of  such  representation  being  defrayed 
by  local  subscription.  And,  furthermore,  every 
Japanese  can  worship  the  supreme  divinities  of 
Shinto  in  his  own  house,  where  upon  a  "  god-shelf" 
(Kamidana)  are  tablets  inscribed  with  the  assurance 
of  their  divine  protection,  —  holy  charms  obtained 
from  the  priests  of  Ise  or  of  Kitzuki.  In  the  case 
of  the  Ise  cult,  such  tablets  are  commonly  made 
from  the  wood  of  the  holy  shrines  themselves,  which, 
according  to  primal  custom,  must  be  rebuilt  every 
twenty  years,  —  the  timber  of  the  demolished  struc 
tures  being  then  cut  into  tablets  for  distribution 
throughout  the  country. 

Another  development  of  ancestor-worship  —  the 
cult  of  gods  presiding  over  crafts  and  callings  — 
deserves  special  study.  Unfortunately  we  are  as 
yet  little  informed  upon  the  subject.  Anciently  this 
worship  must  have  been  more  definitely  ordered 
and  maintained  than  it  is  now.  Occupations  were 
hereditary ;  artizans  were  grouped  into  guilds  — 
perhaps  we  might  even  say  castes  ;  —  and  each  guild 
or  caste  then  probably  had  its  patron-deity.  In 
some  cases  the  craft-gods  may  have  been  ancestors 


DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO          139 

of  Japanese  craftsmen  ;  in  other  cases  they  were 
perhaps  of  Korean  or  Chinese  origin,  —  ancestral 
gods  of  immigrant  artizans,  who  brought  their  cults 
with  them  to  Japan.  Not  much  is  known  about 
them.  But  it  is  tolerably  safe  to  assume  that  most, 
if  not  all  of  the  guilds,  were  at  one  time  religiously 
organized,  and  that  apprentices  were  adopted  not 
only  in  a  craft,  but  into  a  cult.  There  were  corpo 
rations  of  weavers,  potters,  carpenters,  arrow-makers, 
bow-makers,  smiths,  boat-builders,  and  other  trades 
men  ;  and  the  past  religious  organization  of  these  is 
suggested  by  the  fact  that  certain  occupations  assume 
a  religious  character  even  to-day.  For  example,  the 
carpenter  still  builds  according  to  Shinto  tradition : 
he  dons  a  priestly  costume  at  a  certain  stage  of  the 
work,  performs  rites,  and  chants  invocations,  and 
places  the  new  house  under  the  protection  of  the 
gods.  But  the  occupation  of  the  swordsmith  was  in 
old  days  the  most  sacred  of  crafts  :  he  worked  in 
priestly  garb,  and  practised  Shinto  rites  of  purifica 
tion  while  engaged  in  the  making  of  a  good  blade. 
Before  his  smithy  was  then  suspended  the  sacred 
rope  of  rice-straw  (shlme-nawa)^  which  is  the  oldest 
symbol  of  Shinto  :  none  even  of  his  family  might 
enter  there,  or  speak  to  him ;  and  he  ate  only  of 
food  cooked  with  holy  fire. 

The   195,000  shrines  of  Shint5    represent,  how 
ever,  more  than  clan-cults  or  guild-cults  or  national- 


I4o          DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO 

cults.  .  .  .  Many  are  dedicated  to  different  spirits 
of  the  same  god ;  for  Shint5  holds  that  the  spirit 
of  either  a  man  or  a  god  may  divide  itself  into 
several  spirits,  each  with  a  different  character.  Such 
separated  spirits  are  called  waka-mi-tama  (cc  august- 
divided-spirits  ").  Thus  the  spirit  of  the  Goddess 
of  Food,  Toyo-uke-bime,  separated  itself  into  the 
God  of  Trees,  Kukunochi-no-Kami,  and  into  the 
Goddess  of  Grasses,  Kayanu-hime-no-Kami.  Gods 
and  men  were  supposed  to  have  also  a  Rough 
Spirit  and  a  Gentle  Spirit ;  and  Hirata  remarks  that 
the  Rough  Spirit  of  Oho-kuni-nushi-no-Kami  was 
worshipped  at  one  temple,  and  his  Gentle  Spirit  at 
another.1  .  .  .  Also  we  have  to  remember  that 
great  numbers  of  Ujigami  temples  are  dedicated  to 
the  same  divinity.  These  duplications  or  multipli 
cations  are  again  offset  by  the  fact  that  in  some  of 
the  principal  temples  a  multitude  of  different  deities 
are  enshrined.  Thus  the  number  of  Shinto  temples 
in  actual  existence  affords  no  indication  whatever  of 
the  actual  number  of  gods  worshipped,  nor  of  the 
variety  of  their  cults.  Almost  every  deity  men 
tioned  in  the  Ko-ji-ki  or  Nihongi  has  a  shrine  some 
where  ;  and  hundreds  of  others  —  including  many 
later  apotheoses  —  have  their  temples.  Numbers 
of  temples  have  been  dedicated,  for  example,  to 

1  Even  men  had  the  Rough  and  the  Gentle  Spirit ;  but  a  god  had  three  distinct 
spirits, — the  Rough,  the  Gentle,  and  the  Bestowing,  —  respectively  termed  Ara- 
mi-tama,  Nigi-mi-tamat  and  Saki-mi-tama.  —  [See  SATOW'S  Revival  of  Pure 


DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO  141 

historical  personages,  —  to  spirits  of  great  ministers, 
captains,  rulers,  scholars,  heroes,  and  statesmen. 
The  famous  minister  of  the  Empress  Jingo,  Take- 
no-uji-no-Sukune, —  who  served  under  six  succes 
sive  sovereigns,  and  lived  to  the  age  of  three 
hundred  years,  —  is  now  invoked  in  many  a  temple 
as  a  giver  of  long  life  and  great  wisdom.  The  spirit 
of  Sugiwara-no-Michizane,  once  minister  to  the 
Emperor  Daigo,  is  worshipped  as  the  god  of  callig 
raphy,  under  the  name  of  Tenjin,  or  Temmangu : 
children  everywhere  offer  to  him  the  first  examples 
of  their  handwriting,  and  deposit  in  receptacles, 
placed  before  his  shrine,  their  worn-out  writing- 
brushes.  The  Soga  brothers,  victims  and  heroes 
of  a  famous  twelfth-century  tragedy,  have  become 
gods  to  whom  people  pray  for  the  maintenance  of 
fraternal  harmony.  Kato  Kiyomasa,  the  determined 
enemy  of  Jesuit  Christianity,  and  Hideyoshi's 
greatest  captain,  has  been  apotheosized  both  by 
Buddhism  and  by  Shinto.  lyeyasu  is  worshipped 
under  the  appellation  of  Toshogu.  In  fact  most  of 
the  great  men  of  Japanese  history  have  had  temples 
erected  to  them  ;  and  the  spirits  of  the  daimyo  were, 
in  former  years,  regularly  worshipped  by  the  sub 
jects  of  their  descendants  and  successors. 

Besides  temples  to  deities  presiding  over  indus 
tries  and  agriculture,  —  or  deities  especially  invoked 
by  the  peasants,  such  as  the  goddess  of  silkworms, 


I42  DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO 

the  goddess  of  rice,  the  gods  of  wind  and  weather, 
—  there  are  to  be  found  in  almost  every  part  of 
the  country  what  I  may  call  propitiatory  temples. 
These  latter  Shinto  shrines  have  been  erected  by 
way  of  compensation  to  spirits  of  persons  who  suf 
fered  great  injustice  or  misfortune.  In  these  cases 
the  worship  assumes  a  very  curious  character,  the 
worshipper  always  appealing  for  protection  against 
the  same  kind  of  calamity  or  trouble  as  that  from 
which  the  apotheosized  person  suffered  during  life. 
In  Izumo,  for  example,  I  found  a  temple  dedicated 
to  the  spirit  of  a  woman,  once  a  prince's  favourite. 
She  had  been  driven  to  suicide  by  the  intrigues  of 
jealous  rivals.  The  story  is  that  she  had  very  beau 
tiful  hair ;  but  it  was  not  quite  black,  and  her  ene 
mies  used  to  reproach  her  with  its  color.  Now 
mothers  having  children  with  brownish  hair  pray  to 
her  that  the  brown  may  be  changed  to  black ;  and 
offerings  are  made  to  her  of  tresses  of  hair  and 
Tokyo  coloured  prints,  for  it  is  still  remembered 
that  she  was  fond  of  such  prints.  In  the  same 
province  there  is  a  shrine  erected  to  the  spirit  of  a 
young  wife,  who  pined  away  for  grief  at  the  absence 
of  her  lord.  She  used  to  climb  a  hill  to  watch  for 
his  return,  and  the  shrine  was  built  upon  the  place 
where  she  waited  ;  and  wives  pray  there  to  her  for 
the  safe  return  of  absent  husbands.  .  .  .  An  almost 
similar  kind  of  propitiatory  worship  is  practised  in 
cemeteries.  Public  pity  seeks  to  apotheosize  those 


DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO          143 

urged  to  suicide  by  cruelty,  or  those  executed  for 
offences  which,  although  legally  criminal,  were  in 
spired  by  patriotic  or  other  motives  commanding 
sympathy.  Before  their  graves  offerings  are  laid  and 
prayers  are  murmured.  Spirits  of  unhappy  lovers 
are  commonly  invoked  by  young  people  who  suffer 
from  the  same  cause.  .  .  .  And,  among  other  forms 
of  propitiatory  worship  I  must  mention  the  old  cus 
tom  of  erecting  small  shrines  to  spirits  of  animals, 
—  chiefly  domestic  animals,  —  either  in  recognition 
of  dumb  service  rendered  and  ill-rewarded,  or  as  a 
compensation  for  pain  unjustly  inflicted. 

Yet  another  class  of  tutelar  divinities  remains 
to  be  noticed,  —  those  who  dwell  within  or  about 
the  houses  of  men.  Some  are  mentioned  in  the 
old  mythology,  and  are  probably  developments 
of  Japanese  ancestor-worship ;  some  are  of  alien 
origin ;  some  do  not  appear  to  have  any  tem 
ples  ;  and  some  represent  little  more  than  what 
is  called  Animism.  This  class  of  divinities  cor 
responds  rather  to  the  Roman  dii  genitales  than 
to  the  Greek  Scu/xo^es.  Suijin-Sama,  the  God  of 
Wells ;  Kojin,  the  God  of  the  Cooking-range  (in 
almost  every  kitchen  there  is  either  a  tiny  shrine  for 
him,  or  a  written  charm  bearing  his  name)  ;  the  gods 
of  the  Cauldron  and  Saucepan,  Kudo-no-Kami  and 
Kobe-no-Kami  (anciently  called  Okitsuhiko  and 
Okitsuhime) ;  the  Master  of  Ponds,  Ike-no-Nushi, 


144          DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO 

supposed  to  make  apparition  in  the  form  of  a 
serpent ;  the  Goddess  of  the  Rice-pot,  O-Kama- 
Sama ;  the  Gods  of  the  Latrina,  who  first  taught 
men  how  to  fertilize  their  fields  (these  are  commonly 
represented  by  little  figures  of  paper,  having  the 
forms  of  a  man  and  a  woman,  but  faceless)  ;  the 
Gods  of  Wood  and  Fire  and  Metal  ;  the  Gods  like 
wise  of  Gardens,  Fields,  Scarecrows,  Bridges,  Hills, 
Woods,  and  Streams ;  and  also  the  Spirits  of  Trees 
(for  Japanese  mythology  has  its  dryads)  :  most  of 
these  are  undoubtedly  of  Shinto.  On  the  other 
hand,  we  find  the  roads  under  the  protection  of 
Buddhist  deities  chiefly.  I  have  not  been  able  to 
learn  anything  regarding  gods  of  boundaries,  —  ter- 
mesy  as  the  Latins  called  them  ;  and  one  sees  only 
images  of  the  Buddhas  at  the  limits  of  village  terri 
tories.  But  in  almost  every  garden,  on  the  north 
«ide,  there  is  a  little  Shint5  shrine,  facing  what  is 
called  the  Ki-Mon,  or  "Demon-Gate,"  —  that  is  to 
say,  the  direction  from  which,  according  to  Chinese 
teaching,  all  evils  come ;  and  these  little  shrines, 
dedicated  to  various  Shinto  deities,  are  supposed  to 
protect  the  home  from  evil  spirits.  The  belief  in 
the  Ki-Mon  is  obviously  a  Chinese  importation. 

One  may  doubt,  however,  if  Chinese  influence 
alone  developed  the  belief  that  every  part  of  a 
house, —  every  beam  of  it,  —  and  every  domestic 
utensil  has  its  invisible  guardian.  Considering  this 
belief,  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  building  of  «i 


DEVELOPMENTS   OF   SHINTO          145 

house — unless  the  house  be  in  foreign  style  —  is 
still  a  religious  act,  and  that  the  functions  of  a 
master-builder  include  those  of  a  priest. 

This  brings  us  to  the  subject  of  Animism.  (I 
doubt  whether  any  evolutionist  of  the  contemporary 
school  holds  to  the  old-fashioned  notion  that  ani 
mism  preceded  ancestor-worship,  —  a  theory  in 
volving  the  assumption  that  belief  in  the  spirits  of 
inanimate  objects  was  evolved  before  the  idea  of  a 
human  ghost  had  yet  been  developed.)  In  Japan  it 
is  now  as  difficult  to  draw  the  line  between  animistic 
beliefs  and  the  lowest  forms  of  Shinto,  as  to  establish 
a  demarcation  between  the  vegetable  and  the  animal 
worlds ;  but  the  earliest  Shinto  literature  gives  no 
evidence  of  such  a  developed  animism  as  that  now 
existing.  Probably  the  development  was  gradual, 
and  largely  influenced  by  Chinese  beliefs.  Still,  we 
read  in  the  Ko-ji-ki  of  "  evil  gods  who  glittered  like 
fireflies  or  were  disorderly  as  mayflies,"  and  of 
"demons  who  made  rocks,  and  stumps  of  trees, 
and  the  foam  of  the  green  waters  to  speak,"  — 
showing  that  animistic  or  fetichistic  notions  were 
prevalent  to  some  extent  before  the  period  of  Chi 
nese  influence.  And  it  is  significant  that  where 
animism  is  associated  with  persistent  worship  (as  in 
the  matter  of  the  reverence  paid  to  strangely  shaped 
stones  or  trees),  the  form  of  the  worship  is,  in  most 
cases,  Shinto.  Before  such  objects  there  is  usually 


146  DEVELOPMENTS    OF   SHINTO 

to  be  seen  the  model  of  a  Shint5  gateway,  —  torn.  .  .  . 
With  the  development  of  animism,  under  Chinese 
and  Korean  influence,  the  man  of  Old  Japan  found 
himself  truly  in  a  world  of  spirits  and  demons. 
They  spoke  to  him  in  the  sound  of  tides  and  of 
cataracts,  in  the  moaning  of  wind  and  the  whispers 
of  leafage,  in  the  crying  of  birds,  and  the  trilling 
of  insects,  in  all  the  voices  of  nature.  For  him  all 
visible  motion  —  whether  of  waves  or  grasses  or 
shifting  mist  or  drifting  cloud  —  was  ghostly  ;  and 
the  never  moving  rocks — nay,  the  very  stones  by 
the  wayside  —  were  informed  with  viewless  and 
awful  being. 


Worship   and  Purification 


Worship   and   Purification 

WE  have  seen  that,  in  Old  Japan,  the  world 
of  the  living  was  everywhere  ruled  by  the 
world  of  the  dead,  —  that  the  individual, 
at  every  moment  of  his  existence,  was  under  ghostly 
supervision.  In  his  home  he  was  watched  by  the 
spirits  of  his  fathers ;  without  it,  he  was  ruled  by 
the  god  of  his  district.  All  about  him,  and  above 
him,  and  beneath  him  were  invisible  powers  of  life 
and  death.  In  his  conception  of  nature  all  things 
were  ordered  by  the  dead,  —  light  and  darkness, 
weather  and  season,  winds  and  tides,  mist  and  rain, 
growth  and  decay,  sickness  and  health.  The  view 
less  atmosphere  was  a  phantom-sea,  an  ocean  of 
ghost ;  the  soil  that  he  tilled  was  pervaded  by  spirit- 
essence  ;  the  trees  were  haunted  and  holy ;  even 
the  rocks  and  the  stones  were  infused  with  conscious 
life.  ...  How  might  he  discharge  his  duty  to  the 
infinite  concourse  of  the  invisible  ? 

Few  scholars  could  remember  the  names  of  all 
the  greater  gods,  not  to  speak  of  the  lesser ;  and  no 
mortal  could  have  found  time  to  address  those 
greater  gods  by  their  respective  names  in  his  daily 

149 


I5o         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

prayer.  The  later  Shinto  teachers  proposed  to 
simplify  the  duties  of  the  faith  by  prescribing  one 
brief  daily  prayer  to  the  gods  in  general,  and  special 
prayers  to  a  few  gods  in  particular ;  and  in  thus 
doing  they  were  most  likely  confirming  a  custom 
already  established  by  necessity.  Hirata  wrote : 
"  As  the  number  of  the  gods  who  possess  different 
functions  is  very  great,  it  will  be  convenient  to 
worship  by  name  the  most  important  only,  and 
to  include  the  rest  in  a  general  petition."  He  pre 
scribed  ten  prayers  for  persons  having  time  to 
repeat  them,  but  lightened  the  duty  for  busy  folk, 

—  observing :     "  Persons    whose    daily    affairs    are 
so    multitudinous    that    they  have  not  time  to    go 
through    all    the    prayers,  may  content   themselves 
with  adoring  (i)  the  residence  of  the  Emperor,  (2) 
the  domestic  god-shelf,  —  kamidana,  (3)  the  spirits 
of  their    ancestors,    (4)    their    local    patron-god, — 
Ujigami)  (5)  the  deity  of  their  particular  calling." 
He    advised    that    the    following  prayer  should  be 
daily  repeated  before  the  "  god-shelf"  :  — 

"  Reverently  adoring  the  great  god  of  the  two  palaces 
of  Ise  in  the  first  place,  —  the  eight  hundred  myriads  of 
celestial  gods, — the  eight  hundred  myriads  of  terrestrial 
gods,  —  the  fifteen  hundred  myriads  of  gods  to  whom  are 
consecrated  the  great  and  small  temples  in  all  provinces,  all 
islands,  and  all  places  of  the  Great  Land  of  Eight  Islands, 

—  the  fifteen  hundred  myriads  of  gods  whom  they  cause  to 
serve  them,  and  the  gods  of  branch-palaces  and  branch- 


WORSHIP    AND    PURIFICATION         151 

temples,  —  and  Sohodo-no-Kami l  whom  I  have  invited  to 
the  shrine  set  up  on  this  divine  shelf,  and  to  whom  I  offer 
praises  day  by  day,  —  I  pray  with  awe  that  they  will  deign 
to  correct  the  unwilling  faults  which,  heard  and  seen  by 
them,  I  have  committed ;  and  that,  blessing  and  favour 
ing  me  according  to  the  powers  which  they  severally  wield, 
they  will  cause  me  to  follow  the  divine  example,  and  to 
perform  good  works  in  the  Way." 2 

This  text  is  interesting  as  an  example  of  what 
Shinto's  greatest  expounder  thought  a  Shinto  prayer 
should  be  ;  and,  excepting  the  reference  to  So-ho- 
do-no-Kami,  the  substance  of  it  is  that  of  the  morn 
ing  prayer  still  repeated  in  Japanese  households* 
But  the  modern  prayer  is  very  much  shorter.  .  .  . 
In  Izumo,  the  oldest  Shinto  province,  the  customary 
morning  worship  offers  perhaps  the  best  example  of 
the  ancient  rules  of  devotion.  Immediately  upon 
rising,  the  worshipper  performs  his  ablutions ;  and 
after  having  washed  his  face  and  rinsed  his  mouth, 
he  turns  to  the  sun,  claps  his  hands,  and  with  bowed 
head  reverently  utters  the  simple  greeting:  "Hail 
to  thee  this  day,  August  One  ! "  In  thus  adoring 
the  sun  he  is  also  fulfilling  his  duty  as  a  subject, — 
paying  obeisance  to  the  Imperial  Ancestor.  .  .  , 
The  act  is  performed  out  of  doors,  not  kneeling, 
but  standing;  and  the  spectacle  of  this  simple  wor 
ship  is  impressive.  I  can  now  see  in  memory,— 

1  Sohodo-no-Kami  is  the  god  of  scarecrows,  —  protector  of  the  fields. 

2  Translated  by  Satow. 


152         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

just  as  plainly  as  I  saw  with  my  eyes  many  years 
ago,  off  the  wild  Oki  coast,  —  the  naked  figure  of  a 
young  fisherman  erect  at  the  prow  of  his  boat,  clap 
ping  his  hands  in  salutation  to  the  rising  sun,  whose 
ruddy  glow  transformed  him  into  a  statue  of  bronze. 
Also  I  retain  a  vivid  memory  of  pilgrim-figures 
poised  upon  the  topmost  crags  of  the  summit  of 
Fuji,  clapping  their  hands  in  prayer,  with  faces  to 
the  East.  .  .  .  Perhaps  ten  thousand  —  twenty 
thousand  —  years  ago  all  humanity  so  worshipped 
the  Lord  of  Day.  .  .  . 

After  having  saluted  the  sun,  the  worshipper 
returns  to  his  house,  to  pray  before  the  Kamidana 
and  before  the  tablets  of  the  ancestors.  Kneeling, 
he  invokes  the  great  gods  of  Ise  or  of  Izumo,  the 
gods  of  the  chief  temples  of  his  province,  the  god 
of  his  parish-temple  also  (Ujigami),  and  finally  all 
the  myriads  of  the  deities  of  Shint5.  These  prayers 
are  not  said  aloud.  The  ancestors  are  thanked  for 
the  foundation  of  the  home ;  the  higher  deities  are 
invoked  for  aid  and  protection.  ...  As  for  the 
custom  of  bowing  in  the  direction  of  the  Emperor's 
palace,  I  am  not  able  to  say  to  what  extent  it  sur 
vives  in  the  remoter  districts ;  but  I  have  often  seen 
the  reverence  performed.  Once,  too,  I  saw  rever 
ence  done  immediately  in  front  of  the  gates  of  the 
palace  in  Tokyo  by  country-folk  on  a  visit  to  the 
capital.  They  knew  me,  because  I  had  often 
sojourned  in  their  village ;  and  on  reaching  Tokyo 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         153 

tney  sought  me  out,  and  found  me.  I  took  them 
to  the  palace ;  and  before  the  main  entrance  they 
removed  their  hats,  and  bowed,  and  clapped  their 
hands,  — just  as  they  would  have  done  when  salut 
ing  the  gods  or  the  rising  sun,  —  and  this  with  a 
simple  and  dignified  reverence  that  touched  me  not 
a  little. 

The  duties  of  morning  worship,  which  include 
the  placing  of  offerings  before  the  tablets,  are  not 
the  only  duties  of  the  domestic  cult.  In  a  Shinto 
household,  where  the  ancestors  and  the  higher  gods 
are  separately  worshipped,  the  ancestral  shrine  may 
be  said  to  correspond  with  the  Roman  lararium ; 
while  the  "  god-shelf,"  with  its  taima  or  o-nusa  (sym 
bols  of  those  higher  gods  especially  revered  by  the 
family),  may  be  compared  with  the  place  accorded 
by  Latin  custom  to  the  worship  of  the  Penates. 
Both  Shinto  cults  have  their  particular  feast-days ; 
and,  in  the  case  of  the  ancestor-cult,  the  feast-days 
are  occasions  of  religious  assembly,  —  when  the 
relatives  of  the  family  should  gather  to  celebrate 
the  domestic  rite.  .  .  .  The  Shintoist  must  also 
take  part  in  the  celebration  of  the  festivals  of  the 
Ujigami,  and  must  at  least  aid  in  the  celebration  of 
the  nine  great  national  holidays  related  to  the  national 
cult ;  these  nine,  out  of  a  total  eleven,  being  occa 
sions  of  imperial  ancestor-worship. 

The  nature  of  the  public  rites  varied  according  to 


154         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

the  rank  of  the  gods.  Offerings  and  prayers  were 
made  to  all ;  but  the  greater  deities  were  worshipped 
with  exceeding  ceremony.  To-day  the  offerings 
usually  consist  of  food  and  rice-wine,  together  with 
symbolic  articles  representing  the  costlier  gifts  of 
woven  stuffs  presented  by  ancient  custom.  The 
ceremonies  include  processions,  music,  singing,  and 
dancing.  At  the  very  small  shrines  there  are  few 
ceremonies,  —  only  offerings  of  food  are  presented. 
But  at  the  great  temples  there  are  hierarchies  of 
priests  and  priestesses  (miko)  —  usually  daughters 
of  priests ;  and  the  ceremonies  are  elaborate  and 
solemn.  It  is  particularly  at  the  temples  of  Ise 
(where,  down  to  the  fourteenth  century  the  high- 
priestess  was  a  daughter  of  emperors),  or  at  the 
great  temple  of  Izumo,  that  the  archaic  character 
of  the  ceremonial  can  be  studied  to  most  advantage. 
There,  in  spite  of  the  passage  of  that  huge  wave 
of  Buddhism,  which  for  a  period  almost  submerged 
the  more  ancient  faith,  all  things  remain  as  they 
were  a  score  of  centuries  ago ;  —  Time,  in  those 
haunted  precincts,  would  seem  to  have  slept,  as 
in  the  enchanted  palaces  of  fairy-tale.  The  mere 
shapes  of  the  buildings,  weird  and  tall,  startle  by 
their  unfamiliarity.  Within,  all  is  severely  plain 
and  pure  :  there  are  no  images,  no  ornaments,  no 
symbols  visible  —  except  those  strange  paper-cut 
tings  (gohei),  suspended  to  upright  rods,  which  are 
symbols  of  offerings  and  also  tokens  of  the  view- 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         155 

ess.  By  the  number  of  them  in  the  sanctuary,  you 
know  the  number  of  the  deities  to  whom  the  place 
is  consecrate.  There  is  nothing  imposing  but  the 
space,  the  silence,  and  the  suggestion  of  the  past. 
The  innermost  shrine  is  veiled  :  it  contains,  perhaps, 
a  mirror  of  bronze,  an  ancient  sword,  or  other  ob 
ject  enclosed  in  multiple  wrappings :  that  is  all. 
For  this  faith,  older  than  icons,  needs  no  images : 
its  gods  are  ghosts ;  and  the  void  stillness  of  its 
shrines  compels  more  awe  than  tangible  representa 
tion  could  inspire.  Very  strange,  to  Western  eyes 
at  least,  are  the  rites,  the  forms  of  the  worship,  the 
shapes  of  sacred  objects.  Not  by  any  modern 
method  must  the  sacred  fire  be  lighted,  —  the  fire 
that  cooks  the  food  of  the  gods :  it  can  be  kindled 
only  in  the  most  ancient  of  ways,  with  a  wooden 
fire-drill.  The  chief  priests  are  robed  in  the  sacred 
colour,  —  white,  —  and  wear  headdresses  of  a  shape 
no  longer  seen  elsewhere  :  high  caps  of  the  kind 
formerly  worn  by  lords  and  princes.  Their  assist 
ants  wear  various  colours,  according  to  grade ;  and 
the  faces  of  none  are  completely  shaven  ;  — -  some 
wear  full  beards,  others  the  mustache  only.  The 
actions  and  attitudes  of  these  hierophants  are  digni 
fied,  yet  archaic,  in  a  degree  difficult  to  describe. 
Each  movement  is  regulated  by  tradition ;  and  to 
perform  well  the  functions  of  a  Kannushi,  a  long 
disciplinary  preparation  is  necessary.  The  office  is 
hereditary ;  the  training  begins  in  boyhood ;  and 


156         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

the  impassive  deportment  eventually  acquired  is 
really  a  wonderful  thing.  Officiating,  the  Kannushi 
seems  rather  a  statue  than  a  man,  —  an  image  moved 
by  invisible  strings ;  —  and,  like  the  gods,  he  never 
winks.  Not  at  least  observably.  .  .  .  Once,  dur 
ing  a  great  Shinto  procession,  several  Japanese 
friends,  and  I  myself,  undertook  to  watch  a  young 
priest  on  horseback,  in  order  to  see  how  long  he 
could  keep  from  winking ;  and  none  of  us  were  able 
to  detect  the  slightest  movement  of  eyes  or  eyelids, 
notwithstanding  that  the  priest's  horse  became  res 
tive  during  the  time  that  we  were  watching. 

The  principal  incidents  of  the  festival  ceremonies 
within  the  great  temples  are  the  presentation  of  the 
offerings,  the  repetition  of  the  ritual,  and  the  danc 
ing  of  the  priestesses.  Each  of  these  perform 
ances  retains  a  special  character  rigidly  fixed  by 
tradition.  The  food-offerings  are  served  upon 
archaic  vessels  of  unglazed  pottery  (red  earthen 
ware  mostly) :  boiled  rice  pressed  into  cones  of  the 
form  of  a  sugar-loaf,  various  preparations  of  fish 
and  of  edible  sea-weed,  fruits  and  fowls,  rice-wine 
presented  in  jars  of  immemorial  shape.  These 
offerings  are  carried  into  the  temple  upon  white 
wooden  trays  of  curious  form,  and  laid  upon  white 
wooden  tables  of  equally  curious  form;  —  the  faces 
of  the  bearers  being  covered,  below  the  eyes,  with 
sheets  of  white  paper,  in  order  that  their  breath  may 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         157 

not  contaminate  the  food  of  the  gods  ;  and  the  trays, 
for  like  reason,  must  be  borne  at  arms'  length.  .  .  . 
In  ancient  times  the  offerings  would  seem  to  have 
included  things  much  more  costly  than  food,  —  if 
we  may  credit  the  testimony  of  what  are  probably 
the  oldest  documents  extant  in  the  Japanese  tongue, 
the  Shinto  rituals,  or  norito.1  The  following  excerpt 
from  Satow's  translation  of  the  ritual  prayer  to  the 
Wind-gods  of  Tatsuta  is  interesting,  not  only  as  a 
fine  example  of  the  language  of  the  norito,  but  also 
as  indicating  the  character  of  the  great  ceremonies  in 
early  ages,  and  the  nature  of  the  offerings  :  — 

u  As  the  great  offerings  set  up  for  the  Youth-god,  I  set 
up  various  sorts  of  offerings  :  for  Clothes,  bright  cloth, 
glittering  cloth,  soft  cloth,  and  coarse  cloth,  —  and  the  five 
kinds  of  things,  a  mantlet,  a  spear,  a  horse  furnished  with 
a  saddle ;  —  for  the  Maiden-god  I  set  up  various  sorts  of 
offerings  —  providing  Clothes,  a  golden  thread-box,  a  golden 
tatart,  a  golden  skein-holder,  bright  cloth,  glittering  cloth, 
soft  cloth,  and  coarse  cloth,  and  the  five  kinds  of  things,  a 
horse  furnished  with  a  saddle ;  —  as  to  Liquor,  I  raise  high 
the  beer-jars,  fill  and  range-in-a-row  the  bellies  of  the  beer- 
jars  ;  soft  grain  and  coarse  grain ;  —  as  to  things  which 
dwell  in  the  hills,  things  soft  of  hair  and  things  coarse  of 
hair ;  —  as  to  things  which  grow  in  the  great  field-plain, 
sweet  herbs  and  bitter  herbs  ;  —  as  to  things  which  dwell  in 
the  blue  sea-plain,  things  broad  of  fin  and  things  narrow 
of  fin  —  down  to  the  weeds  of  the  offing  and  weeds  of  the 

1  Several  have  been  translated  by  Satow,  whose  opinion  of  their  antiquity  b  herf 
cited  }  and  translations  have  also  been  made  into  German. 


158         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

shore.  And  if  the  sovran  gods  will  take  these  great  offer 
ings  which  I  set  up,  —  piling  them  up  like  a  range  of  hills, 
—  peacefully  in  their  hearts,  as  peaceful  offerings  and  satis 
factory  offerings ;  and  if  the  sovran  gods,  deigning  not 
to  visit  the  things  produced  by  the  great  People  of  the 
region  under  heaven  with  bad  winds  and  rough  waters,  will 
ripen  and  bless  them,  —  I  will  at  the  autumn  service  set  up 
the  first  fruits,  raising  high  the  beer-jars,  filling  and  rang- 
ing-in-rows  the  bellies  of  the  beer-jars,  —  and  drawing 
them  hither  in  juice  and  in  ear,  in  many  hundred  rice- 
plants  and  a  thousand  rice-plants.  And  for  this  purpose 
the  princes  and  councillors  and  all  the  functionaries,  the 
servants  of  the  six  farms  of  the  country  of  Yamato  — 
even  to  the  males  and  females  of  them  —  have  all  come 
and  assembled  in  the  fourth  month  of  this  year,  and,  plung 
ing  down  the  root  of  the  neck  cormorant-wise  in  the  presence 
of  the  sovran  gods,  fulfil  their  praise  as  the  Sun  of  to-day 
rises  in  glory."  .  .  . 

The  offerings  are  no  longer  piled  up  "  like  a 
range  of  hills,"  nor  do  they  include  "  all  things 
dwelling  in  the  mountains  and  in  the  sea  "  ;  but  the 
imposing  ritual  remains,  and  the  ceremony  is  always 
impressive.  Not  the  least  interesting  part  of  it  is 
the  sacred  dance.  While  the  gods  are  supposed  to 
be  partaking  of  the  food  and  wine  set  out  before 
their  shrines,  the  girl-priestesses,  robed  in  crimson 
and  white,  move  gracefully  to  the  sound  of  drums 
and  flutes,  —  waving  fans,  or  shaking  bunches  of  tiny 
bells  as  they  circle  about  the  sanctuary.  According 
to  our  Western  notions,  the  performance  of  the 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         159 

miko  could  scarcely  be  called  dancing ;  but  it  is  a 
graceful  spectacle,  and  very  curious,  —  for  every 
step  and  attitude  is  regulated  by  traditions  of  un 
known  antiquity.  As  for  the  plaintive  music,  no 
Western  ear  can  discern  in  it  anything  resembling  a 
real  melody ;  but  the  gods  should  find  delight  in  it, 
because  it  is  certainly  performed  for  them  to-day 
exactly  as  it  used  to  be  performed  twenty  centuries 
ago. 

I  speak  of  the  ceremonies  especially  as  I  have 
witnessed  them  in  Izumo :  they  vary  somewhat 
according  to  cult  and  province.  At  the  shrines  of 
Ise,  Kasuga,  Kompira,  and  several  others  which  I 
visited,  the  ordinary  priestesses  are  children ;  and 
when  they  have  reached  the  nubile  age,  they  retire 
from  the  service.  At  Kitzuki  the  priestesses  are 
grown-up  women :  their  office  is  hereditary ;  and 
they  are  permitted  to  retain  it  even  after  marriage. 

Formerly  the  Miko  was  more  than  a  mere  offi 
ciant  :  the  songs  which  she  is  still  obliged  to  learn 
indicate  that  she  was  originally  offered  to  the  gods 
as  a  bride.  Even  yet  her  touch  is  holy ;  the 
grain  sown  by  her  hand  is  blessed.  At  some  time 
in  the  past  she  seems  to  have  been  also  a  pytho 
ness  :  the  spirits  of  the  gods  possessed  her  and 
spoke  through  her  lips.  All  the  poetry  of  this 
most  ancient  of  religions  centres  in  the  figure  of  its 
little  Vestal,  —  child-bride  of  ghosts,  —  as  she  flutters, 


1 60         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

like  some  wonderful  white-and-crimson  butterfly, 
before  the  shrine  of  the  Invisible.  Even  in  these 
years  of  change,  when  she  must  go  to  the  public 
school,  she  continues  to  represent  all  that  is  delight 
ful  in  Japanese  girlhood ;  for  her  special  home- 
training  keeps  her  reverent,  innocent,  dainty  in  all 
her  little  ways,  and  worthy  to  remain  the  pet  of 
the  gods. 

The  history  of  the  higher  forms  of  ancestor- 
worship  in  other  countries  would  lead  us  to  suppose 
that  the  public  ceremonies  of  the  Shinto-cult  must 
include  some  rite  of  purification.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  the  most  important  of  all  Shinto  ceremonies  is 
the  ceremony  of  purification,  —  o-harai,  as  it  is  called, 
which  term  signifies  the  casting-out  or  expulsion 
of  evils.  ...  In  ancient  Athens  a  corresponding 
ceremony  took  place  every  year ;  in  Rome,  every 
four  years.  The  o-harai  is  performed  twice  every 
year,  —  in  the  sixth  month  and  the  twelfth  month 
by  the  ancient  calendar.  It  used  to  be  not  less 
obligatory  than  the  Roman  lustration ;  and  the  idea 
behind  the  obligation  was  the  same  as  that  which 
inspired  the  Roman  laws  on  the  subject.  ...  So 
long  as  men  believe  that  the  welfare  of  the  living 
depends  upon  the  will  of  the  dead,  —  that  all 
happenings  in  the  world  are  ordered  by  spirits  of 
different  characters,  evil  as  well  as  good,  —  that 
every  bad  action  lends  additional  power  to  the  view- 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION          161 

less  forces  of  destruction,  and  therefore  endangers 
the  public  prosperity,  —  so  long  will  the  necessity 
of  a  public  purification  remain  an  article  of  common 
faith.  The  presence  in  any  community  of  even  one 
person  who  has  offended  the  gods,  consciously  or 
unwillingly,  is  a  public  misfortune,  a  public  peril. 
Yet  it  is  not  possible  for  all  men  to  live  so  well  as 
never  to  vex  the  gods  by  thought,  word,  or  deed^ 
—  through  passion  or  ignorance  or  carelessness. 
"  Every  one/'  declares  Hirata,  "  is  certain  to  com 
mit  accidental  offences,  however  careful  he  may 
be.  ...  Evil  acts  and  words  are  of  two  kinds : 
those  of  which  we  are  conscious,  and  those  of  which 
we  are  not  conscious.  ...  It  is  better  to  assume 
that  we  have  committed  such  unconscious  offences." 
Now  it  should  be  remembered  that  for  the  man  of 
Old  Japan,  —  as  for  the  Greek  or  the  Roman  citizen 
of  early  times,  —  religion  consisted  chiefly  in  the 
exact  observance  of  multitudinous  custom  ;  and  that 
it  was  therefore  difficult  to  know  whether,  in  per 
forming  the  duties  of  the  several  cults,  one  had  not 
inadvertently  displeased  the  Unseen.  As  a  means 
of  maintaining  and  assuring  the  religious  purity  of 
the  people,  periodical  lustration  was  consequently 
deemed  indispensable. 

From  the  earliest  period  Shinto  exacted  scrupu 
lous  cleanliness  —  indeed,  we  might  say  that  it 
regarded  physical  impurity  as  identical  with  moral 
impurity,  and  intolerable  to  the  gods.  It  has 


162         WORSHIP    AND    PURIFICATION 

always  been,  and  still  remains,  a  religion  of  ablu 
tions.  The  Japanese  love  of  cleanliness  —  indi 
cated  by  the  universal  practice  of  daily  bathing,  and 
by  the  irreproachable  condition  of  their  homes  — 
has  been  maintained,  and  was  probably  initiated,  by 
their  religion.  Spotless  cleanliness  being  required 
by  the  rites  of  ancestor-worship,  —  in  the  temple, 
in  the  person  of  the  officiant,  and  in  the  home,  — 
this  rule  of  purity  was  naturally  extended  by  degrees 
to  all  the  conditions  of  existence.  And  besides  the 
great  periodical  ceremonies  of  purification,  a  multi 
tude  of  minor  lustrations  were  exacted  by  the  cult. 
This  was  the  case  also,  it  will  be  remembered,  in  the 
early  Greek  and  Roman  civilizations :  the  citizen 
had  to  submit  to  purification  upon  almost  every  im 
portant  occasion  of  existence.  There  were  lustra 
tions  indispensable  at  birth,  marriage,  and  death ; 
lustrations  on  the  eve  of  battle  ;  lustrations,  at  regular 
periods,  of  the  dwelling,  estate,  district,  or  city.  And, 
as  in  Japan,  no  one  could  approach  a  temple  without 
a  preliminary  washing  of  hands.  But  ancient  Shinto 
exacted  more  than  the  Greek  or  the  Roman  cult : 
it  required  the  erection  of  special  houses  for  birth, 
—  "parturition-houses";  special  houses  for  the 
consummation  of  marriage,  —  "  nuptial  huts  "  ;  and 
special  buildings  for  the  dead,  —  "  mourning-houses." 
Formerly  women  were  obliged  during  the  period  of 
menstruation,  as  well  as  during  the  time  of  confine 
ment,  to  live  apart.  These  harsher  archaic  customs 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         163 

have  almost  disappeared,  except  in  one  or  two 
remote  districts,  and  in  the  case  of  certain  priestly 
families ;  but  the  general  rules  as  to  purification, 
and  as  to  the  times  and  circumstances  forbidding 
approach  to  holy  places,  are  still  everywhere  obeyed. 
Purity  of  heart  is  not  less  insisted  upon  than 
physical  purity ;  and  the  great  rite  of  lustration, 
performed  every  six  months,  is  of  course  a  moral 
purification.  It  is  performed  not  only  at  the  great 
temples,  and  at  all  the  Ujigami,  but  likewise  in 
every  home.1 

The  modern  domestic  form  of  the  harai  is  very 
simple.  Each  Shint5  parish-temple  furnishes  to  all 
its  Ujiko,  or  parishioners,  small  paper-cuttings  called 
hitogata  ("mankind-shapes"),  representing  figures 
of  men,  women,  and  children  as  in  silhouette,  — 
only  that  the  paper  is  white,  and  folded  curiously. 
Each  household  receives  a  number  of  hitogata  cor-  / 
responding  to  the  number  of  its  members,  —  "  men- 
shapes  "  for  the  men  and  boys,  "  women-shapes  " 

*  On  the  kamidana,  "or  god-shelf,"  there  is  usually  placed  a  kind  of  oblong 
paper-box  containing  fragments  of  the  wands  used  by  the  priests  of  Ise  at  the  great 
national  purification-ceremony,  or  o-harai.  This  box  is  commonly  called  by  the 
name  of  the  ceremony,  o-barai^  or  "august  purification,"  and  is  inscribed  with 
the  names  of  the  great  gods  of  Ise.  The  presence  of  this  object  is  supposed  to  pro 
tect  the  home  ;  but  it  should  be  replaced  by  a  new  o-barai  at  the  expiration  of  six 
months ;  for  the  virtue  of  the  charm  is  supposed  to  last  only  during  the  interval 
between  two  official  purifications.  This  distribution  to  thousands  of  homes  of  frag 
ments  of  cne  wands,  used  to  "drive  away  evils  "  at  the  time  of  the  Ise  lustration, 
represents  of  course  the  supposed  extension  of  the  high-priest's  protection  to  those 
homes  until  the  time  of  the  next  o-barai. 


1 64         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

for  the  women  and  girls.  Each  person  in  the  house 
touches  his  head,  face,  limbs,  and  body  with  one 
of  these  hitogata ;  repeating  the  while  a  Shintd  invo 
cation,  and  praying  that  any  misfortune  or  sickness 
incurred  by  reason  of  offences  involuntarily  com 
mitted  against  the  gods  (for  in  Shinto  belief  sickness 
and  misfortune  are  divine  punishments)  may  be  mer 
cifully  taken  away.  Upon  each  hitogata  is  then 
written  the  age  and  sex  (not  the  name)  of  the  per 
son  for  whom  it  was  furnished ;  and  when  this  has 
been  done,  all  are  returned  to  the  parish-temple,  and 
there  burnt,  with  rites  of  purification.  Thus  the 
community  is  "lustrated"  every  six  months. 

In  the  old  Greek  and  Latin  cities  lustration  was 
accompanied  with  registration.  The  attendance  of 
every  citizen  at  the  ceremony  was  held  to  be  so  nec 
essary  that  one  who  wilfully  failed  to  attend  might 
be  whipped  and  sold  as  a  slave.  Non-attendance 
involved  loss  of  civic  rights.  It  would  seem  that  in 
Old  Japan  also  every  member  of  a  community  was 
obliged  to  be  present  at  the  rite ;  but  I  have  not 
been  able  to  learn  whether  any  registration  was  made 
upon  such  occasions.  Probably  it  would  have  been 
superfluous  :  the  Japanese  individual  was  not  offi 
cially  recognized ;  the  family-group  alone  was 
responsible,  and  the  attendance  of  the  several  mem 
bers  would  have  been  assured  by  the  responsibility 
of  the  group.  The  use  of  the  hitogata^  on  which 
the  name  is  not  written,  but  only  the  sex  and  age 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         165 

of  the  worshipper,  is  probably  modern,  and  of 
Chinese  origin.  Official  registration  existed,  even  in 
early  times ;  but  it  appears  to  have  had  no  particu 
lar  relation  to  the  o-harai ;  and  the  registers  were 
kept,  it  seems,  not  by  the  Shinto,  but  by  the  Bud 
dhist  parish-priests.  ...  In  concluding  these  re 
marks  about  the  o-harai^  I  need  scarcely  add  that 
special  rites  were  performed  in  cases  of  accidental 
religious  defilement,  and  that  any  person  judged  to 
have  sinned  against  the  rules  of  the  public  cult  had 
to  submit  to  ceremonial  purification. 

Closely  related  by  origin  to  the  rites  of  purifica 
tion  are  sundry  ascetic  practices  of  Shint5.  It  is  not 
an  essentially  ascetic  religion  :  it  offers  flesh  and 
wine  to  its  gods ;  and  it  prescribes  only  such  forms 
of  self-denial  as  ancient  custom  and  decency  require. 
Nevertheless,  some  of  its  votaries  perform  extraor 
dinary  austerities  on  special  occasions,  —  austerities 
which  always  include  much  cold-water  bathing.  It 
is  not  uncommon  for  the  very  fervent  worshipper 
to  invoke  the  gods  as  he  stands  naked  under  the 
ice-cold  rush  of  a  cataract  in  midwinter.  .  .  .  But 
the  most  curious  phase  of  this  Shinto  asceticism  is 
represented  by  a  custom  still  prevalent  in  remote 
districts.  According  to  this  custom  a  community 
yearly  appoints  one  of  its  citizens  to  devote  himself 
wholly  to  the  gods  on  behalf  of  the  rest.  During 
the  term  of  his  consecration,  this  communal  repre- 


i66         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

sentative  must  separate  from  his  family,  must  not 
approach  women,  must  avoid  all  places  of  amuse 
ment,  must  eat  only  food  cooked  with  sacred  fire, 
must  abstain  from  wine,  must  bathe  in  fresh  cold 
water  several  times  a  day,  must  repeat:  particular 
prayers  at  certain  hours,  and  must  keep  vigil  upon 
certain  nights.  When  he  has  performed  these 
duties  of  abstinence  and  purification  for  the  specified 
time,  he  becomes  religiously  free ;  and  another  man 
is  then  elected  to  take  his  place.  The  prosperity 
of  the  settlement  is  supposed  to  depend  upon  the 
exact  observance  by  its  representative  of  the  duties 
prescribed :  should  any  public  misfortune  occur,  he 
would  be  suspected  of  having  broken  his  vows. 
Anciently,  in  the  case  of  a  common  misfortune,  the 
representative  was  put  to  death.  In  the  little  town 
of  Mionoseki,  where  I  first  learned  of  this  custom, 
the  communal  representative  is  called  ichi-nen- 
gannushi  ("one-year  god-master");  and  his  full 
term  of  vicarious  atonement  is  twelve  months.  I 
was  told  that  elders  are  usually  appointed  for  this 
duty,  —  young  men  very  seldom.  In  ancient  times 
such  a  communal  representative  was  called  by  a  name 
signifying  £C  abstainer/'  References  to  the  custom 
have  been  found  in  Chinese  notices  of  Japan  dat 
ing  from  a  time  before  the  beginning  of  Japanese 
authentic  history. 

Every  persistent  form  of  ancestor-worship  has  its 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         167 

system  or  systems  of  divination  ;  and  Shinto  exem 
plifies  the  general  law.  Whether  divination  ever 
obtained  in  ancient  Japan  the  official  importance 
which  it  assumed  among  the  Greeks  and  the  Romans 
is  at  present  doubtful.  But  long  before  the  intro 
duction  of  Chinese  astrology,  magic,  and  fortune- 
telling,  the  Japanese  practised  various  kinds  of 
divination,  as  is  proved  by  their  ancient  poetry, 
their  records,  and  their  rituals.  We  find  mention 
also  of  official  diviners,  attached  to  the  great  cults. 
There  was  divination  by  bones,  by  birds,  by  rice, 
by  barley-gruel,  by  footprints,  by  rods  planted  in 
the  ground,  and  by  listening  in  public  ways  to  the 
speech  of  people  passing  by.  Nearly  all  —  probably 
all  —  of  these  old  methods  of  divination  are  still  in 
popular  use.  But  the  earliest  form  of  official  divina 
tion  was  performed  by  scorching  the  shoulder-blade 
of  a  deer,  or  other  animal,  and  observing  the  cracks 
produced  by  the  heat.1  Tortoise-shells  were  after 
wards  used  for  the  same  purpose.  Diviners  were 
especially  attached,  it  appears,  to  the  imperial  palace ; 
and  Motowori,  writing  in  the  latter  half  of  the  eigh 
teenth  century,  speaks  of  divination  as  still  being,  in 
that  epoch5  a  part  of  the  imperial  function.  "To 

1  Concerning  this  form  of  divination,  Satow  remarks  that  it  was  practised  by  the 
Mongols  in  the  time  of  Genghis  Khan,  and  is  still  practised  by  the  Khirghiz 
Tartars,  —  facts  of  strong  interest  in  view  of  the  probable  origin  of  the  early 
Japanese  tribes. 

For  instances  of  ancient  official  divination  see  Aston's  translation  of  the  Nibongi, 
Vol.  I,  pp.  157,  189,  227,  229,  237. 


168         WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

the  end  of  time,"  he  said,  "  the  Mikado  is  the  child 
of  the  Sun-goddess.  His  mind  is  in  perfect  har 
mony  of  thought  and  feeling  with  hers.  He  does 
not  seek  out  new  inventions ;  but  he  rules  in 
accordance  with  precedents  which  date  from  the 
Age  of  the  Gods ;  and  if  he  is  ever  in  doubt,  he 
has  recourse  to  divination,  which  reveals  to  him  the 
mind  of  the  great  goddess." 

Within  historic  times  at  least,  divination  would 
not  seem  to  have  been  much  used  in  warfare, — • 
certainly  not  to  the  extent  that  it  was  used  by  the 
Greek  and  Roman  armies.  The  greatest  Japanese 
captains,  —  such  as  Hideyoshi  and  Nobunaga  — 
were  decidedly  irreverent  as  to  omens.  Probably 
the  Japanese,  at  an  early  period  of  their  long  mili 
tary  history,  learned  by  experience  that  the  general 
who  conducts  his  campaign  according  to  omens 
must  always  be  at  a  hopeless  disadvantage  in  deal 
ing  with  a  skilful  enemy  who  cares  nothing  about 
omens. 

Among  the  ancient  popular  forms  of  divination 
which  still  survive,  the  most  commonly  practised 
in  households  is  divination  by  dry  rice.  For  the 
public,  Chinese  divination  is  still  in  great  favour ; 
but  it  is  interesting  to  observe  that  the  Japanese 
fortune-teller  invariably  invokes  the  Shintd  gods 
before  consulting  his  Chinese  books,  and  maintains 
a  Shinto  shrine  in  his  reception-room. 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION 

We  have  seen  that  the  developments  of  ancestor- 
worship  in  Japan  present  remarkable  analogies  with 
the  developments  of  ancestor-worship  in  ancient 
Europe,  —  especially  in  regard  to  the  public  cult, 
with  its  obligatory  rites  of  purification. 

But  Shinto  seems  nevertheless  to  represent  con 
ditions  of  ancestor-worship  less  developed  than 
those  which  we  are  accustomed  to  associate  with 
early  Greek  and  Roman  life ;  and  the  coercion 
which  it  exercised  appears  to  have  been  propor 
tionally  more  rigid.  The  existence  of  the  individ 
ual  worshipper  was  ordered  not  merely  in  relation 
to  the  family  and  the  community,  but  even  in  rela 
tion  to  inanimate  things.  Whatever  his  occu 
pation  might  be,  some  god  presided  over  it ; 
whatever  tools  he  might  use,  they  had  to  be  used 
in  such  manner  as  tradition  prescribed  for  all  ad 
mitted  to  the  craft-cult.  It  was  necessary  that  the 
carpenter  should  so  perform  his  work  as  to  honour 
the  deity  of  carpenters,  —  that  the  smith  should 
fulfil  his  daily  task  so  as  to  honour  the  god  of  the 
bellows,  —  that  the  farmer  should  never  fail  in 
respect  to  the  earth-god,  and  the  food-god,  and  the 
scare-crow  god,  and  the  spirits  of  the  trees  about  his 
habitation.  Even  the  domestic  utensils  were  sacred : 
the  servant  could  not  dare  to  forget  the  presence 
of  the  deities  of  the  cooking-range,  the  hearth,  the 
cauldron,  the  brazier,  —  or  the  supreme  necessity  of 
keeping  the  fire  pure.  The  professions,  not  less 


170         WORSHIP    AND    PURIFICATION 

than  the  trades,  were  under  divine  patronage :  the 
physician,  the  teacher,  the  artist  —  each  had  his 
religious  duties  to  observe,  his  special  traditions  to 
obey.  The  scholar,  for  example,  could  not  dare  to 
treat  his  writing-implements  with  disrespect,  or  put 
written  paper  to  vulgar  uses  :  such  conduct  would 
offend  the  god  of  calligraphy.  Nor  were  women 
ruled  less  religiously  than  men  in  their  various 
occupations :  the  spinners  and  weaving-maidens 
were  bound  to  revere  the  Weaving-goddess  and  the 
Goddess  of  Silkworms ;  the  sewing-girl  was  taught 
to  respect  her  needles ;  and  in  all  homes  there  was 
observed  a  certain  holiday  upon  which  offerings 
were  made  to  the  Spirits  of  Needles.  In  Samurai 
families  the  warrior  was  commanded  to  consider  his 
armour  and  his  weapons  as  holy  things :  to  keep 
them  in  beautiful  order  was  an  obligation  of  which 
the  neglect  might  bring  misfortune  in  the  time  of 
combat ;  and  on  certain  days  offerings  were  set 
before  the  bows  and  spears,  arrows  and  swords,  and 
other  war-implements,  in  the  alcove  of  the  family 
guest-room.  Gardens,  too,  were  holy ;  and  there 
were  rules  to  be  observed  in  their  management,  lest 
offence  should  be  given  to  the  gods  of  trees  and 
flowers.  Carefulness,  cleanliness,  dustlessness,  were 
everywhere  enforced  as  religious  obligations. 

...  It  has  often  been  remarked  in  these  latter 
days  that  the  Japanese  do  not  keep  their  public 
offices,  their  railway  stations,  their  new  factory-build- 


WORSHIP   AND    PURIFICATION         171 

ings,  thus  scrupulously  clean.  But  edifices  built  in 
foreign  style,  with  foreign  material,  under  foreign 
supervision,  and  contrary  to  every  local  tradition, 
must  seem  to  old-fashioned  thinking  God-forsaken 
places ;  and  servants  amid  such  unhallowed  sur 
roundings  do  not  feel  the  invisible  about  them,  the 
weight  of  pious  custom,  the  silent  claim  of  beauti 
ful  and  simple  things  to  human  respect. 


The   Rule   of  the   Dead 


The   Rule  of  the   Dead 

IT  should  now  be  evident  to  the  reader  that 
the  ethics  of  Shinto  were  all  comprised  in  the 
doctrine  of  unqualified  obedience  to  customs 
originating,  for  the  most  part,  in  the  family  cult. 
Ethics  were  not  different  from  religion;  religion 
was  not  different  from  government ;  and  the  very 
word  for  government  signified  "  matters-of-religion." 
All  government  ceremonies  were  preceded  by  prayer 
and  sacrifice ;  and  from  the  highest  rank  of  society 
to  the  lowest  every  person  was  subject  to  the  law 
of  tradition.  To  obey  was  piety ;  to  disobey  wa"5"" 
impious ;  and  the  rule  of  obedience  was  enforced 
upon  each  individual  by  the  will  of  the  community 
to  which  he  belonged.  Ancient  morality  consisted 
in  the  minute  observance  of  rules  of  conduct  regard 
ing  the  household,  the  community,  and  the  higher 
authority. 

But  these  rules  of  behaviour  mostly  represented 
the  outcome  of  social  experience  ;  and  it  was  scarcely 
possible  to  obey  them  faithfully,  and  yet  to  remain 
a  bad  man.  They  commanded  reverence  toward 
the  Unseen,  respect  for  authority,  affection  to  par- 

'75 


176  THE   RULE   OF   THE   DEAD 

ents,  tenderness  to  wife  and  children,  kindness  to 
neighbours,  kindness  to  dependants,  diligence  and 
exactitude  in  labour,  thrift  and  cleanliness  in  habit. 
Though  at  first  morality  signified  no  more  than  obe 
dience  to  tradition,  tradition  itself  gradually  became 
identified  with  true  morality.  To  imagine  the  conse 
quent  social  condition  is,  of  course,  somewhat  difficult 
for  the  modern  mind.  Among  ourselves,  religious 
ethics  and  social  ethics  have  long  been  practically 
dissociated ;  and  the  latter  have  become,  with  the 
gradual  weakening  of  faith,  more  imperative  and 
important  than  the  former.  Most  of  us  learn, 
sooner  or  later  in  life,  that  it  is  not  enough  to  keep  the 
ten  commandments,  and  that  it  is  much  less  danger 
ous  to  break  most  of  the  commandments  in  a  quiet 
way  than  to  violate  social  custom.  But  in  Old 
Japan  there  was  no  distinction  tolerated  between 
ethics  and  custom  —  between  moral  requirements 
and-^frcial  obligations^*  convention  identified  both, 
and  to  conceal  a  breach  of  either  was  impossible,  — 
as  privacy  did  not  exist.  Moreover  the  unwritten 
commandments  were  not  limited  to  ten ;  they 
were  numbered  by  hundreds,  and  the  least  infringe 
ment  was  punishable,  not  merely  as  a  blunder,  but 
as  a  sin.  Neither  in  his  own  home  nor  anywhere 
else  could  the  ordinary  person  do  as  he  pleased ; 
and  the  extraordinary  person  was  under  the  surveil 
lance  of  zealous  dependants  whose  constant  duty  was 
to  reprove  any  breach  of  usage.  The  religion  capa- 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     177 

ble  of  regulating  every  act  of  existence  by  the  force 
of  common  opinion  requires  no  catechism. 

Early  moral  custom  must  be  coercive  custom." 
But  as  many  habits,  at  first  painfully  formed  under 
compulsion  only,  become  easy  through  constant  rep 
etition,  and  at  last  automatic,  so  the  conduct  com 
pelled  through  many  generations  by  religious  and 
civil  authority,  tends  eventually  to  become  almost 
instinctive.  Much  depends,  no  doubt,  upon  the  * — 
degree  to  which  religious  compulsion  is  hindered 
by  exterior  causes,  —  by  long-protracted  war,  for 
example,  —  and  in  Old  Japan  there  was  interfer 
ence  extraordinary.  Nevertheless,  the  influence  of 
Shinto  accomplished  wonderful  things,  —  evolved^ 
a  national  type  of  character  worthy,  in  many  ways,  \ 
of  earnest  admiration.  The  ethical  sentiment  devel 
oped  in  that  character  differed  widely  from  our  own  ; 
but  it  was  exactly  adapted  to  the  social  requirements. 
For  this  national  type  of  moral  character  was  in 
vented  the  name  Yamato-damashi  (or  Yamato-gokoro), 
—  the  Soul  of  Yamato  (or  Heart  of  Yamato), — 
the  appellation  of  the  old  province  of  Yamato,  seat 
of  the  early  emperors,  being  figuratively  used  for 
the  entire  country.  We  might  correctly,  though 
less  literally,  interpret  the  expression  Yamato- 
damashi  as  « The  Soul  of  Old  Japan." 

It  was  in  reference  to  this  "  Soul  of  Old  Japan  " 
that    the    great  Shinto    scholars   of  the    eighteenth 


178  THE    RULE   OF  THE   DEAD 

and  nineteenth  centuries  put  forth  their  bold  asser- 
tion  that  conscience  alone  was  a  sufficient  ethical 
guide.  They  declared  the  high  quality  of  the 
Japanese  conscience  a  proof  of  the  divine  origin 
of  the  race.  "  Human  beings,"  wrote  Motowori, 
"having  been  produced  by  the  spirits  of  the  two 
Creative  Deities,  are  naturally  endowed  with  the 
knowledge  of  what  they  ought  to  do,  and  of  what 
they  ought  to  refrain  from  doing.  It  is  unneces 
sary  for  them  to  trouble  their  minds  with  systems 
of  morality.  If  a  system  of  morals  were  necessary, 
men  would  be  inferior  to  animals,  —  all  of  whom 
are  endowed  with  the  knowledge  of  what  they 
ought  to  do,  only  in  an  inferior  degree  to 
men."  1  .  .  .  Mabuchi,  at  an  earlier  day,  had  made 
a  comparison  between  Japanese  and  Chinese  mo 
rality,  greatly  to  the  disadvantage  of  the  latter.  "In 
ancient  times,"  said  Mabuchi,  "  when  men's  disposi 
tions  were  straightforward,  a  complicated  system  of 
morals  was  unnecessary.  It  would  naturally  hap 
pen  that  bad  actions  might  be  occasionally  com 
mitted  ;  but  the  straightforwardness  of  men's 
dispositions  would  prevent  the  evil  from  being 
concealed  and  so  growing  in  extent.  So  in  those 
days  it  was  unnecessary  to  have  a  doctrine  of  right 
and  wrong.  But  the  Chinese,  being  bad  at  heart, 
in  spite  of  the  teaching  which  they  got,  were  good 

1  All  of  these  extracts  are  quoted    from  Satow's   great  essay  on    the    Shinto 
revival. 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     179 

only  on  the  outside ;  so  their  bad  acts  became  of 
such  magnitude  that  society  was  thrown  into  dis 
order.  The  Japanese,  being  straightforward,  could 
do  without  teaching."  Motowori  repeated  these 
ideas  in  a  slightly  different  way :  "  It  is  because 
the  Japanese  were  truly  moral  in  their  practice  that 
they  required  no  theory  of  morals ;  and  the  fuss 
made  by  the  Chinese  about  theoretical  morals  is 
owing  to  their  laxity  in  practice.  .  .  .  To  have 
learned  that  there  is  no  Way  [ethical  system]  to  be 
learned  and  practised,  is  really  to  have  learned  to 
practise  the  Way  of  the  Gods."  At  a  later  day 
Hirata  wrote :  "  Learn  to  stand  in  awe  of  the 
Unseen,  and  that  will  prevent  you  from  doing 
wrong.  Cultivate  the  conscience  implanted  in  you  : 
then  you  will  never  wander  from  the  Way." 

Though  the  sociologist  may  smile  at  these  decla 
rations  of  moral  superiority  (especially  as  based  on 
the  assumption  that  the  race  had  been  better  in 
primeval  times,  when  yet  fresh  from  the  hands  of 
the  gods),  there  was  in  them  a  grain  of  truth. 
When  Mabuchi  and  Motowori  wrote,  the  nation 
had  been  long  subjected  to  a  discipline  of  almost 
incredible  minuteness  in  detail,  and  of  extraordinary 
rigour  in  application.  And  this  discipline  had 
actually  brought  into  existence  a  wonderful  average 
of  character,  —  a  character  of  surprising  patience, 
unselfishness,  honesty,  kindliness,  and  docility  com 
bined  with  high  courage.  But  only  the  evolutionist 


i8o  THE    RULE    OF   THE    DEAD 

can  imagine  what  the  cost  of  developing  that  cha* 
acter  must  have  been. 

It  is  necessary  here  to  observe  that  the  disci 
pline  to  which  the  nation  had  been  subjected  up  to 
the  age  of  the  great  Shint5  writers,  seems  to  have 
had  a  curious  evolutional  history  of  its  own.  In 
primitive  times  it  had  been  much  less  uniform, 
less  complex,  less  minutely  organized,  though  not 
less  implacable  ;  and  it  had  continued  to  develop 
and  elaborate  more  and  more  with  the  growth  and 
consolidation  of  society,  until,  under  the  Toku- 
gawa  Shogunate  the  possible  maximum  of  regula 
tion  was  reached.  In  other  words,  the  yoke  had 
been  made  heavier  and  heavier  in  proportion  to  the 
growth  of  the  national  strength,  —  in  proportion 
to  the  power  of  the  people  to  bear  it.  ...  We 
have  seen  that,  from  the  beginning  of  this  civiliza 
tion,  the  whole  life  of  the  citizen  was  ordered  for 
him :  his  occupation,  his  marriage,  his  rights  of 
fatherhood,  his  rights  to  hold  or  to  dispose  of  prop 
erty, —  all  these  matters  were  settled  by  religious 
custom.  We  have  also  seen  that  outside  as  well  as 
inside  of  his  home,  his  actions  were  under  supervi 
sion,  and  that  a  single  grave  breach  of  usage  might 
cause  his  social  ruin,  —  in  which  case  he  would  be 
given  to  understand  that  he  was  not  merely  a  social, 
but  also  a  religious  offender  ;  that  the  communal  god 
was  angry  with  him ;  and  that  to  pardon  his  fault  might 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     181 

provoke  the  divine  vengeance  against  the  entire 
settlement.  But  it  yet  remains  to  be  seen  what 
rights  were  left  him  by  the  central  authority  ruling 
his  district,  —  which  authority  represented  a  third 
form  of  religious  despotism  from  which  there  was 
no  appeal  in  ordinary  cases. 

Material  for  the  study  of  the  old  laws  and  cus 
toms  have  not  yet  been  collected  in  sufficient 
quantity  to  yield  us  full  information  as  to  the  con 
ditions  of  all  classes  before  Meiji.  But  a  great  deal 
of  precious  work  has  been  accomplished  in  this 
direction  by  American  scholars ;  and  the  labours  of 
Professor  Wigmore  and  of  the  late  Dr.  Simmons 
have  furnished  documentary  evidence  from  which 
much  can  be  learned  about  the  legal  status  of  the 
masses  during  the  Tokugawa  period.  This,  as  I 
have  said,  was  the  period  of  the  most  elaborated 
regulation.  The  extent  to  which  the  people  were 
controlled  can  be  best  inferred  from  the  nature  and 
number  of  the  sumptuary  laws  to  which  they  were 
subjected.  Sumptuary  laws  in  Old  Japan  probably 
exceeded  in  multitude  and  minuteness  anything  of 
which  Western  legal  history  yields  record.  Rigidly 
as  the  family-cult  dictated  behaviour  in  the  home, 
strictly  as  the  commune  enforced  its  standards  of 
communal  duty, — just  so  rigidly  and  strictly  did 
the  rulers  of  the  nation  dictate  how  the  individual 
—  man,  woman,  or  child  —  should  dress,  walk,  sit, 


182  THE    RULE    OF   THE    DEAD 

speak,  work,  eat,  drink.     Amusements  were  not  less 
unmercifully  regulated  than  were  labours. 

Every  class  of  Japanese  society  was  under  sump 
tuary  regulation,  —  the  degree  of  regulation  varying 
in  different  centuries  ;  and  this  kind  of  legislation 
appears  to  have  been  established  at  an  early  period. 
It  is  recorded  that,  in  the  year  68 1  A.D.,  the 
Emperor  Temmu  regulated  the  costumes  of  all 
classes,  —  "from  the  Princes  of  the  Blood  down  to 
the  common  people,  —  and  the  wearing  of  head 
dresses  and  girdles,  as  well  as  of  all  kinds  of  coloured 
stuffs,  —  according  to  a  scale."  The  costumes  and 
the  colours  to  be  worn  by  priests  and  nuns  had  been 
already  fixed,  by  an  edict  issued  in  679  A.D.  After 
wards  these  regulations  were  greatly  multiplied  and 
detailed.  But  it  was  under  the  Tokugawa  rulers,  a 
thousand  years  later,  that  sumptuary  laws  obtained 
their  most  remarkable  development;  and  the  nature 
of  them  is  best  indicated  by  the  regulations  applying 
to  the  peasantry.  Every  detail  of  the  farmer's  exist 
ence  was  prescribed  for  by  law,  —  from  the  size, 
form,  and  cost  of  his  dwelling,  down  even  to  such 
trifling  matters  as  the  number  and  the  quality  of  the 
dishes  to  be  served  to  him  at  meal-times.  A  farmer 
with  an  income  of  100  koku  of  rice —  (let  us  say  90 
to  ^100  per  annum)  —  might  build  a  house  60  feet 
long,  but  no  longer :  he  was  forbidden  to  construct 
it  with  a  room  containing  an  alcove ;  and  he  was  not 

1  See  Nibongi,  Aston's  translation,  Vol.  II,  pp.  343,  348,  350. 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     183 

allowed  —  except  by  special  permission  —  to  roof  it 
with  tiles.  None  of  his  family  were  permitted  to 
wear  silk ;  and  in  case  of  the  marriage  of  his 
daughter  to  a  person  legally  entitled  to  wear  silk, 
the  bridegroom  was  to  be  requested  not  to  wear 
silk  at  the  wedding.  Three  kinds  of  viands  only 
were  to  be  served  at  the  wedding  of  such  a  farmer's 
daughter  or  son  ;  and  the  quality  as  well  as  the 
quantity  of  the  soup,  fish,  or  sweetmeats  offered 
to  the  wedding-guests,  were  legally  fixed.  So  like 
wise  the  number  of  the  wedding-gifts  :  even  the  cost 
of  the  presents  of  rice-wine  and  dried  fish  was  pre 
scribed,  and  the  quality  of  the  single  fan  which  it 
was  permissible  to  offer  the  bride.  At  no  time  was 
a  farmer  allowed  to  make  any  valuable  presents  to 
his  friends.  At  a  funeral  he  might  serve  the  guests 
with  certain  kinds  of  plain  food  ;  but  if  rice-wine 
were  served  it  was  not  to  be  served  in  wine-cups,  — 
only  in  soup-cups  !  [The  latter  regulation  probably 
referred  to  Shinto  funerals  in  especial.]  On  the 
occasion  of  a  child's  birth,  the  grandparents  were 
allowed  to  make  only  four  presents  (according  to 
custom),  —  including  "  one  cotton  baby-dress  "  ;  and 
the  values  of  the  presents  were  fixed.  On  the 
occasion  of  the  Boy's  Festival,  the  presents  to  be 
given  to  the  child  by  the  whole  family,  including 
grandparents,  were  limited  by  law  to  "  one  paper- 
flag,"  and  "  two  toy-spears."  ...  A  farmer  whose 
property  was  assessed  at  50  koku  was  forbidden  to 


184  THE    RULE    OF    THE    DEAD 

build  a  house  more  than  45  feet  long.  At  the 
wedding  of  his  daughter  the  gift-girdle  was  not  to 
exceed  50  sen  in  value  ;  and  it  was  forbidden  to 
serve  more  than  one  kind  of  soup  at  the  wed 
ding-feast  .  .  A  farmer  with  a  property  assessed 
at  20  koku  was  not  allowed  to  build  a  house  more 
than  36  feet  long,  or  to  use  in  building  it  such 
superior  qualities  of  wood  as  keyaki  or  hinoki.  The 
roof  of  his  house  was  to  be  made  of  bamboo-thatch 
or  straw ;  and  he  was  strictly  forbidden  the  comfort 
of  floor-mats.  On  the  occasion  of  the  wedding  of 
his  daughter  he  was  forbidden  to  have  fish  or  any 
roasted  food  served  at  the  wedding-feast.  The 
women  of  his  family  were  not  allowed  to  wear 
leather  sandals  :  they  might  wear  only  straw-sandals 
or  wooden  clogs ;  and  the  thongs  of  the  sandals  or 
the  clogs  were  to  be  made  of  cotton.  The  women 
were  further  forbidden  to  wear  hair-bindings  of  silk, 
or  hair-ornaments  of  tortoise-shells  ;  but  they  might 
wear  wooden  combs  and  combs  of  bone  —  not  ivory. 
The  men  were  forbidden  to  wear  stockings,  and 
their  sandals  were  to  be  made  of  bamboo.1 
They  were  also  forbidden  to  use  sun-shades  — 
hi-gasa  —  or  paper-umbrellas.  ...  A  farmer 
assessed  at  10  koku  was  forbidden  to  build  a  house 
more  than  30  feet  long.  The  women  of  his  family 
were  required  to  wear  sandals  with  thongs  of  bam- 

1  There  are  sandals  or  clogs  made  of  bamboo-wood,   but  the  meaning  here  is 
bamboo-grass. 


THE   RULE   OF   THE   DEAD  185 

boo-grass.  At  the  wedding  of  his  son  or  daughter 
one  present  only  was  allowed,  —  a  quilt-chest.  At 
the  birth  of  his  child  one  present  only  was  to  be 
made :  namely,  one  toy-spear,  in  the  case  of  a  boy  ; 
or  one  paper-doll,  or  one  "  mud-doll,"  in  the  case 
of  a  girl.  ...  As  for  the  more  unfortunate  class 
of  farmers,  having  no  land  of  their  own,  and  offi 
cially  termed  mizunomi,  or  "  water-drinkers,"  it  is 
scarcely  necessary  to  remark  that  these  were  still 
more  severely  restricted  in  regard  to  foo  ^  apparel, 
etc.  They  were  not  even  allowed,  for  example,  to 
have  a  quilt-chest  as  a  wedding-present.  But  a  fair 
idea  of  the  complexity  of  these  humiliating  restric 
tions  can  only  be  obtained  by  reading  the  documents 
published  by  Professor  Wigmore,  which  chiefly  con 
sist  of  paragraphs  like  these  :  — 

"The  collar  and  the  sleeve-ends  of  the  clothes  may  be 
ornamented  with  silk,  and  an  obi  (soft  girdle)  of  silk  or 
crepe-silk  may  be  worn  —  but  not  in  public."  .  .  . 

u  A  family  ranking  less  than  20  koku  must  use  the  Takeda- 
wan  (Takeda  rice-bowl),  and  the  Nikkb-%en  (Nikko  tray)." 
.  .  .  [These  were  utensils  of  the  cheapest  kind  of 
lacquer-ware.] 

"  Large  farmers  or  chiefs  of  Kumi  may  use  umbrellas ; 
but  small  farmers  and  farm-labourers  must  use  only  mino 
(straw-raincoats),  and  broad  straw-hats."  .  .  . 

These  documents  published  by  Professor  Wig- 
more  contain  only  the  regulations  issued  for  the 
daimiate  of  Maizuru ;  but  regulations  equally 


i86  THE   RULE   OF   THE   DEAD 

minute  and  vexatious  appear  to  have  been  enforced 
throughout  the  whole  country.  In  Izumo  I  found 
that,  prior  to  Meiji,  there  were  sumptuary  laws  pre 
scribing  not  only  the  material  of  the  dresses  to  be 
worn  by  the  various  classes,  but  even  the  colours  of 
them,  and  the  designs  of  the  patterns.  The  size 
of  rooms,  as  well  as  the  size  of  houses,  was  fixed 
there  by  law,  —  also  the  height  of  buildings  and  of 
fences,  the  number  of  windows,  the  material  of  con 
struction.  ...  It  is  difficult  for  the  Western  mind 
to  understand  how  human  beings  could  patiently 
submit  to  laws  that  regulated  not  only  the  size  of 
one's  dwelling,  and  the  cost  of  its  furniture,  but 
even  the  substance  and  character  of  clothing,  —  not 
only  the  expense  of  a  wedding  outfit,  but  the  quality 
of  the  marriage-feast,  and  the  quality  of  the  vessels 
in  which  the  food  was  to  be  served,  —  not  only  the 
kind  of  ornaments  to  be  worn  in  a  woman's  hair, 
but  the  material  of  the  thongs  of  her  sandals,  —  not 
only  the  price  of  presents  to  be  made  to  friends,  but 
>the  character  and  the  cost  of  the  cheapest  toy  to  be 
given  to  a  child.  And  the  peculiar  constitution  of 
society  made  it  possible  to  enforce  this  sumptuary 
legislation  by  communal  will ;  the  people  were 
obliged  to  coerce  themselves!  Each  community; ' 
as  we  have  seen,  had  been  organized  in  groups  of 
five  or  more  households,  called  kumi;  and  the  heads 
of  the  households  forming  a  kumi  elected  one  of 
their  nurnber  as  kumi-gashiray  or  group-chief,  directly 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     187 

responsible  to  the  higher  authority.  The  kumi  was 
accountable  for  the  conduct  of  each  and  all  of  its 
members ;  and  each  member  was  in  some  sort 
responsible  for  the  rest.  "  Every  member  of  a 
kumi,'1  declares  one  of  the  documents  above  men 
tioned,  "  must  carefully  watch  the  conduct  of  his 
fellow-members.  If  any  one  violates  these  regula 
tions,  without  due  excuse,  he  is  to  be  punished ;  and 
his  kumi  will  also  be  held  responsible."  Responsi 
ble  even  for  the  serious  offence  of  giving  more  than 
one  paper-doll  to  a  child !  .  .  .  But  we  should 
remember  that  in  early  Greek  and  Roman  societies 
there  was  much  legislation  of  a  similar  kind.  The 
laws  of  Sparta  regulated  the  way  in  which  a  woman 
should  dress  her  hair ;  the  laws  of  Athens  fixed  the 
number  of  her  robes.  At  Rome,  in  early  times, 
women  were  forbidden  to  drink  wine ;  and  a  similar 
law  existed  in  the  Greek  cities  of  Miletus  and 
Massilia.  In  Rhodes  and  Byzantium  the  citizen 
was  forbidden  to  shave ;  in  Sparta  he  was  forbidden 
to  wear  a  moustache.  (I  need  scarcely  refer  to  the 
later  Roman  laws  regulating  the  cost  of  marriage- 
feasts,  and  the  number  of  guests  that  might  be 
invited  to  a  banquet ;  for  this  legislation  was 
directed  chiefly  against  luxury.)  The  astonishment 
evoked  by  Japanese  sumptuary  laws,  particularly 
as  inflicted  upon  the  peasantry,  is  justified  less  by 
their  general  character  than  by  their  implacable 
minuteness,  —  their  ferocity  of  detail.  .  .  . 


188  THE    RULE    OF    THE    DEAD 

Where  a  man's  life  was  legally  ordered  even  to 
the  least  particulars,  —  even  to  the  quality  of  his 
foot-gear  and  head-gear,  the  cost  of  his  wife's  hair 
pins,  and  the  price  of  his  child's  doll,  —  one  could 
hardly  suppose  that  freedom  of  speech  would  have 
been  tolerated.  It  did  not  exist ;  and  the  degree  to 
which  speech  became  regulated  can  be  imagined 
only  by  those  who  have  studied  the  spoken 
tongue.  The  hierarchical  organization  of  society 
was  faithfully  reflected  in  the  conventional  organiza 
tion  of  language,  —  in  the  ordination  of  pronouns, 
nouns,  and  verbs,  —  in  the  grades  conferred  upon 
adjectives  by  prefixes  or  suffixes.  With  the  same 
merciless  exactitude  which  prescribed  rules  for  dress, 
diet,  and  manner  of  life,  all  utterance  was  regulated 
both  negatively  and  positively,  —  but  positively 
much  more  than  negatively.  There  was  little 
insistence  upon  what  was  not  to  be  said ;  but  rules 
innumerable  decided  exactly  what  should  be  said, — 
the  word  to  be  chosen,  the  phrase  to  be  used. 
Early  training  enforced  caution  in  this  regard  : 
everybody  had  to  learn  that  only  certain  verbs  and 
nouns  and  pronouns  were  lawful  when  addressing 
superiors,  and  other  words  permissible  only  when 
speaking  to  equals  or  to  inferiors.  Even  the  un 
educated  were  obliged  to  learn  something  about 
this.  But  education  cultivated  a  system  of  verbal 
etiquette  so  multiform  that  only  the  training  of  years 
could  enable  any  one  to  master  it.  Among  the 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     189 

higher  classes  this  etiquette  developed  almost  incon 
ceivable  complexity.  Grammatical  modifications  of 
language,  which,  by  implication,  exalted  the  person 
addressed  or  humbly  depreciated  the  person  address 
ing,  must  have  come  into  general  use  at  some  very 
early  period ;  but  under  subsequent  Chinese  influ 
ence  these  forms  of  propitiatory  speech  multiplied 
exceedingly.  From  the  Mikado  himself — who  still 
makes  use  of  personal  pronouns,  or  at  least  pro 
nominal  expressions,  forbidden  to  any  other  mortal 
—  down  through  all  the  grades  of  society,  each  class 
had  an  "  I  "  peculiarly  its  own.  Of  terms  corre 
sponding  to  "  you  "  or  "  thou  "  there  are  still  six 
teen  in  use ;  but  formerly  there  were  many  more. 
There  are  yet  eight  different  forms  of  the  second 
person  singular  used  only  in  addressing  children, 
pupils,  or  servants.1  Honorific  or  humble  forms  of 
nouns  indicating  relationship  were  similarly  multi 
plied  and  graded :  there  are  still  in  use  nine  terms 
signifying  "  father,"  nine  terms  signifying  "  mother," 
eleven  terms  for  "  wife,"  eleven  terms  for  "  son," 
nine  terms  for  "  daughter,"  and  seven  terms  for 
"  husband."  The  rules  of  the  verb,  above  all, 
were  complicated  by  the  exigencies  of  etiquette  to  a 

1  The  sociologist  will  of  course  understand  that  these  facts  are  not  by  any  means 
inconsistent  with  that  very  sparing  use  of  pronouns  so  amusingly  discussed  in  Percival 
Lowell's  "  Soul  of  the  Far  East."  In  societies  where  subjection  is  extreme  "there 
is  an  avoidance  of  the  use  of  personal  pronouns,"  though,  as  Herbert  Spencer  points 
out  in  illustrating  this  law,  it  is  just  among  such  societies  that  the  most  elaborate 
distinctions  in  pronominal  forms  of  address  are  to  be  found. 


THE    RULE    OF   THE    DEAD 

degree  of  which  no  idea  can  be  given  in  any  brief 
statement.  ...  At  nineteen  or  twenty  years  of  age 
a  person  carefully  trained  from  childhood  might  have 
learned  all  the  necessary  verbal  usages  of  respectable 
society  ;  but  for  a  mastery  of  the  etiquette  of  superior 
converse  many  more  years  of  study  and  experience 
were  required.  With  the  unceasing  multiplication 
of  ranks  and  classes  there  came  into  existence 
a  corresponding  variety  of  forms  of  language : 
it  was  possible  to  ascertain  to  what  class  a  man 
or  a  woman  belonged  by  listening  to  his  or  to 
her  conversation.  The  written,  like  the  spoken 
tongue,  was  regulated  by  strict  convention  :  the 
forms  used  by  women  were  not  those  used  by 
men ;  and  those  differences  in  verbal  etiquette 
arising  from  the  different  training  of  the  sexes 
resulted  in  the  creation  of  a  special  epistolary  style, 
—  a  "  woman's  language,"  which  remains  in  use. 
And  this  sex-differentiation  of  language  was  not 
confined  to  letter-writing :  there  was  a  woman's 
language  also  of  converse,  varying  according  to 
class.  Even  to-day,  in  ordinary  conversation,  an 
educated  woman  makes  use  of  words  and  phrases 
not  employed  by  men.  Samurai  women  especially 
had  their  particular  forms  of  expression  in  feudal 
times ;  and  it  is  still  possible  to  decide,  from  the 
speech  of  any  woman  brought  up  according  to  the 
old  home-training,  whether  she  belongs  to  a  Samurai 
family. 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     191 

Of  course  the  matter  as  well  as  the  manner  of 
converse  was  restricted ;  and  the  nature  of  the 
restraints  upon  free  speech  can  be  inferred  from 
the  nature  of  the  restraints  upon  freedom  of 
demeanour.  Demeanour  was  most  elaborately  and 
mercilessly  regulated,  not  merely  as  to  obeisances, 
of  which  there  were  countless  grades,  varying 
according  to  sex  as  well  as  class,  —  but  even  in 
regard  to  facial  expression,  the  manner  of  smiling, 
the  conduct  of  the  breath,  the  way  of  sitting,  stand 
ing,  walking,  rising.  Everybody  was  trained  from 
infancy  in  this  etiquette  of  expression  and  deport 
ment.  At  what  period  it  first  became  a  mark  of 
disrespect  to  betray,  by  look  or  gesture,  any  feeling 
of  grief  or  pain  in  the  presence  of  a  superior,  we 
cannot  know ;  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the 
most  perfect  self-control  in  this  regard  was  enforced 
from  prehistoric  times.  But  there  was  gradually 
developed  —  partly,  perhaps,  under  Chinese  teach 
ing —  a  most  elaborate  code  of  deportment  which 
exacted  very  much  more  than  impasslveness.  It 
required  not  only  that  any  sense  of  anger  or  pain 
should  be  denied  all  outward  expression,  but  that 
the  sufferer's  face  and  manner  should  indicate  the 
contrary  feeling.  Sullen  submission  was  an  offence  ; 
mere  impassive  obedience  inadequate :  the  proper 
degree  of  submission  should  manifest  itself  by  a 
pleasant  smile,  and  by  a  soft  and  happy  tone  of 
voice.  The  smile,  however,  was  also  regulated. 


192  THE   RULE   OF   THE   DEAD 

One  had  to  be  careful  about  the  quality  of  the  smile, 
it  was  a  mortal  offence,  for  example,  so  to  smile  in 
addressing  a  superior,  that  the  back  teeth  could  be 
seen.  In  the  military  class  especially  this  code  of 
demeanour  was  ruthlessly  enforced.  Samurai  women 
were  required,  like  the  women  of  Sparta,  to  show 
signs  of  joy  on  hearing  that  their  husbands  or  sons 
had  fallen  in  battle :  to  betray  any  natural  feeling 
under  the  circumstances  was  a  grave  breach  of  deco 
rum.  And  in  all  classes  demeanour  was  regulated  so 
severely  that  even  to-day  the  manners  of  the  people 
everywhere  still  reveal  the  nature  of  the  old  disci 
pline.  The  strangest  fact  is  that  the  old-fashioned 
manners  appear  natural  rather  than  acquired,  instinc 
tive  rather  than  made  by  training.  The  bow, — the 
sibilant  indrawing  of  the  breath  which  accompanies 
the  prostration,  and  is  practised  also  in  praying  to 
the  gods,  —  the  position  of  the  hands  upon  the  floor 
in  the  moment  of  greeting  or  of  farewell,  —  the  way 
of  sitting  or  rising  or  walking  in  presence  of  a  guest, 

—  the  manner  of  receiving  or  presenting  anything, 

—  all  these  ordinary  actions  have  a  charm  of  seem 
ing  naturalness  that  mere  teaching  seems  incapable 
of  producing.     And   this  is  still  more  true  of  the 
higher    etiquette,  —  the    exquisite    etiquette  of  the 
old-time  training  in  cultivated  classes,  —  particularly 
as  displayed  by  women.     We  must  suppose  that  the 
capacity  to  acquire  such  manners  depends  consider 
ably  upon    inheritance,  —  that    if   could   only  have 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     193 

been    formed    by  the    past    experience  of  the    race 
under  discipline. 

What  such  discipline,  as  regards  politeness,  must 
have  signified  for  the  mass  of  the  people,  may  be 
inferred  from  the  enactment  of  lyeyasu  authorizing 
a  Samurai  to  kill  any  person  of  the  three  inferior 
classes  guilty  of  rudeness.  Be  it  observed  that 
lyeyasu  was  careful  to  qualify  the  meaning  of 
"  rude  "  :  he  said  that  the  Japanese  term  for  a  rude 
fellow  signified  "  an  other-than-expected  person  "  — 
so  that  to  commit  an  offence  worthy  of  death  it  was 
only  necessary  to  act  in  an  "  unexpected  manner  "  ; 
that  is  to  say,  contrary  to  prescribed  etiquette :  — 

ct  The  Samurai  are  the  masters  of  the  four  classes. 
Agriculturists,  artizans,  and  merchants  may  not  behave  in 
a  rude  manner  towards  Samurai.  The  term  for  a  rude 
man  is  '  other-than-expected  fellow ' ;  and  a  Samurai  is  not 
to  be  interfered  with  in  cutting  down  a  fellow  who  has 
behaved  to  him  in  a  manner  other  than  is  expected.  The 
Samurai  are  grouped  into  direct  retainers,  secondary  retain 
ers,  and  nobles  and  retainers  of  high  and  low  grade ;  but 
the  same  line  of  conduct  is  equally  allowable  to  them  all 
towards  an  other-than-expected  fellow." —  \_Art.  45.] 

But  there  is  little  reason  to  suppose  that  lyeyasu 
created  any  new  privilege  of  slaughter :  he  probably 
did  no  more  than  confirm  by  enactment  certain  long- 
established  military  rights.  Stern  rules  about  the 
conduct  of  inferiors  to  superiors  would  seem  to  have 
been  pitilessly  enforced  long  before  the  rise  of  the 


194  THE   RULE   OF   THE   DEAD 

military  power.  We  read  that  the  Emperor  Yuriakuk 
in  the  latter  part  of  the  fifth  century,  killed  a  steward 
for  the  misdemeanour  of  remaining  silent,  through 
fear,  when  spoken  to :  we  also  find  it  recorded  that 
he  struck  down  a  maid-of-honour  who  had  brought 
him  a  cup  of  wine,  and  that  he  would  have  cut  off 
her  head  but  for  the  extraordinary  presence  of  mind 
which  enabled  her  to  improvise  a  poetical  appeal  for 
mercy.  Her  only  fault  had  been  that,  in  carrying 
the  wine-cup,  she  failed  to  notice  that  a  leaf  had 
fallen  into  it,  —  probably  because  court-custom 
obliged  her  to  carry  the  cup  in  such  a  way  as  not 
to  breathe  upon  it ;  for  emperors  and  high  nobles 
were  served  after  the  manner  of  gods.  It  is  true 
that  Yuriaku  was  in  the  habit  of  killing  people  for 
little  mistakes ;  but  it  is  evident  that,  in  the  cases 
cited,  such  mistakes  were  regarded  as  breaches  of 
long-established  decorum. 

Probably  before  as  well  as  after  the  introduction 
of  the  Chinese  penal  codes,  —  the  so-called  Ming 
and  Tsing  codes,  by  which  the  country  was  ruled 
under  the  Shoguns,  —  the  bulk  of  the  nation  was 
literally  under  the  rod.  Common  folk  were  pun 
ished  by  cruel  whippings  for  the  most  trifling 
offences.  For  serious  offences,  death  by  torture 
was  an  ordinary  penalty  ;  and  there  were  extraor 
dinary  penalties  as  savage,  or  almost  as  savage,  as 
those  established  during  our  own  medieval  period,  — 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     195 

burnings  and  crucifixions  and  quarterings  and  boil 
ing  alive  in  oil.  The  documents  regulating  the  life 
of  village-folk  do  not  contain  any  indication  of  the 
severity  of  legal  discipline :  the  Kumi-cho  declara 
tions  that  such  and  such  conduct  "  shall  be  pun 
ished  "  suggest  nothing  terrible  to  the  reader  who 
has  not  made  himself  familiar  with  the  ancient  codes. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  the  term  "  punishment "  in  a 
Japanese  legal  document  might  signify  anything 
from  a  trifling  fine  up  to  burning  alive.  .  .  .  Some 
evidence  of  the  severity  used  to  repress  quarrelling 
even  as  late  as  the  time  of  lyeyasu,  may  be  found  in 
a  curious  letter  of  Captain  Saris,  who  visited  Japan 
in  1613.  "The  first  of  luly,"  wrote  the  Captain, 
"  two  of  our  Company  happened  to  quarrell  aie  one 
with  the  other,  and  were  very  likely  to  haue  gone 
into  the  field  [i.e.  to  have  fought  a  duel~\  to  the 
endangering  of  vs  all.  For  it  is  a  custome  here  that 
whosoever  drawes  a  weapon  in  anger,  although  he 
do  noe  harme  therewith,  hee  is  presently  cut  in 
peeces ;  and,  doing  but  small  hurt,  not  only  them- 
selues  are  so  executed,  but  their  whole  genera 
tion."  .  .  .  The  literal  meaning  of  "  cut  in 
peeces "  he  explains  later  on,  when  recounting  in 
the  same  letter  an  execution  that  came  under  his 
observation  :  — 

"  The  eighth,  three  laponlans  were  executed,  viz.,  two 
men  and  one  woman:  the  cause  this,  —  the  woman,  none 
of  the  honestest  (her  husband  being  trauelled  from  home) 


196  THE    RULE    OF    THE    DEAD 

had  appointed  these  two  their  several  hours  to  repair  vnto 
her.  The  latter  man,  not  knowing  of  the  former,  and 
comming  in  before  the  houre  appointed,  found  the  first 
man,  and  enraged  thereat,  he  whipped  out  his  cattan 
^katana\  and  wounded  both  of  them  very  sorely, — hauing 
very  neere  hewn  the  chine  of  the  mans  back  in  two. 
But  as  well  as  hee  might  he  cleared  himselfe,  and  recouer- 
ing  his  cattan,  wounded  the  other.  The  street,  taking 
notice  of  the  fray,  forthwith  seased  vpon  them,  led  them 
aside,  and  acquainted  King  Foyne  therewith,  and  sent  to 
know  his  pleasure,  (for  according  to  his  will,  the  partie 
is  executed),  who  presently  gaue  order  that  they  should  cut 
off  their  heads  :  which  done,  euery  man  that  listed  (as  very 
many  did)  came  to  try  the  sharpness  of  their  cattans  vpon 
the  corps,  so  that,  before  they  left  off,  they  had  hewne  them 
all  three  into  peeces  as  small  as  a  mans  hand,  —  and  yet 
notwithstanding,  did  not  then  giue  over,  but,  placing  the 
peeces  one  vpon  another,  would  try  how  many  of  them 
they  could  strike  through  at  a  blow ;  and  the  peeces  are 
left  to  the  fowles  to  deuoure."  .... 

Evidently  the  execution  was  in  this  case  ordered 
for  cause  more  serious  than  the  offence  of  righting ; 
but  it  is  true  that  quarrels  were  strictly  forbidden 
and  rigorously  punished. 

Though  privileged  to  cut  down  "  other-than- 
expected  "  people  of  inferior  rank,  the  military  class 
itself  had  to  endure  a  discipline  even  more  severe 
than  that  which  it  maintained.  The  penalty  for  a 
word  or  a  look  that  displeased,  or  for  a  trifling  mis 
take  in  performance  of  duty,  might  be  death.  In 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     197 

most  cases  the  Samurai  was  permitted  to  be  his  own 
executioner ;  and  the  right  of  self-destruction  was 
deemed  a  privilege ;  but  the  obligation  to  thrust  a 
dagger  deeply  into  one's  belly  on  the  left  side,  and 
then  draw  the  blade  slowly  and  steadily  across  to 
the  right  side,  so  as  to  sever  all  the  entrails,  was 
certainly  not  less  cruel  than  the  vulgar  punishment 
of  crucifixion,  or  rather,  double-transfixion. 

Just  as  all  matters  relating  to  the  manner  of  the 
individual's  life  were  regulated  by  law,  so  were  all 
matters  relating  to  his  death,  —  the  quality  of  his 
coffin,  the  expenses  of  his  interment,  the  order  of 
his  funeral,  the  form  of  his  tomb.  In  the  seventh 
century  laws  were  passed  to  the  effect  that  no  one 
should  be  buried  with  unseemly  expense ;  and  these 
laws  fixed  the  cost  of  funerals  according  to  rank  and 
grade.  Subsequent  edicts  decided  the  dimensions 
and  material  of  coffins,  and  the  size  of  graves.  In 
the  eighth  century  every  detail  of  funerals,  for  all 
classes  of  persons  from  prince  to  peasant,  was  fixed 
by  decree.  Other  laws,  and  modifications  of  laws, 
were  made  upon  the  subject  in  later  centuries ;  but 
there  appears  to  have  always  been  a  general  tendency 
to  extravagance  in  the  matter  of  funerals,  —  a  ten 
dency  so  strong  that,  in  spite  of  centuries  of  sump 
tuary  legislation,  it  remains  to-day  a  social  danger. 
This  can  easily  be  understood  if  we  remember  the 
beliefs  regarding  duty  to  the  dead,  and  the  conse- 


198  THE    RULE    OF   THE    DEAD 

quent  desire  to  honour  and  to  please  the  spirit  even 
at  the  risk  of  family  impoverishment. 

Most  of  the  legislation  to  which  reference  has 
already  been  made  must  appear  to  modern  minds 
tyrannical ;  and  some  of  the  regulations  seem  to  us 
strangely  cruel.  There  was,  moreover,  no  way  of 
evading  or  shirking  these  obligations  of  law  and  cus 
tom  :  whoever  failed  to  fulfil  them  was  doomed  to 
perish  or  to  become  an  outcast;  implicit  obedience 
was  the  condition  of  survival.  The  tendency  of  such 
regulation  was  necessarily  to  suppress  all  mental  and 
moral  differentiation,  to  numb  personality,  to  estab 
lish  one  uniform  and  unchanging  type  of  character; 
and  such  was  the  actual  result.  To  this  day  every 
Japanese  mind  reveals  the  lines  of  that  antique  mould 
by  which  the  ancestral  mind  was  compressed  and 
limited.  It  is  impossible  to  understand  Japanese 
psychology  without  knowing  something  of  the  laws 
that  helped  to  form  it,  —  or,  rather,  to  crystallize  it 
under  pressure. 

Yet,  on  the  other  hand,  the  ethical  effects  of  this 
iron  discipline  were  unquestionably  excellent.  It 
compelled  each  succeeding  generation  to  practise  the 
frugality  of  the  forefathers;  and  that  compulsion  was 
partly  justified  by  the  great  poverty  of  the  nation. 
It  reduced  the  cost  of  living  to  a  figure  far  below 
our  Western  comprehension  of  the  necessary  ;  it 
cultivated  sobriety,  simplicity,  economy  ;  it  enforced 


THE  RULE  OF  THE  DEAD     199 

cleanliness,  courtesy,  and  hardihood.  And — strange 
as  the  fact  may  seem  —  it  did  not  make  the  people 
miserable  :  they  found  the  world  beautiful  in  spite 
of  all  their  trouble ;  and  the  happiness  of  the  old 
life  was  reflected  in  the  old  Japanese  art,  much  as  the 
joyousness  of  Greek  life  yet  laughs  to  us  from  the 
vase-designs  of  forgotten  painters. 

And  the  explanation  is  not  difficult.  We  must 
remember  that  the  coercion  was  not  exercised  only 
from  without :  it  was  really  maintained  from  within. 
The  discipline  of  the  race  was  self-imposed.  The 
people  had  gradually  created  their  own  social  con 
ditions,  and  therefore  the  legislation  conserving  those 
conditions  ;  and  they  believed  that  legislation  the 
best  possible.  They  believed  it  to  be  the  best  pos 
sible  for  the  excellent  reason  that  it  had  been  founded 
upon  their  own  moral  experience ;  and  they  could 
greatly  endure  because  they  had  great  faith.  Only 
religion  could  have  enabled  any  people  to  bear  such 
discipline  without  degenerating  into  mopes  and 
cowards ;  and  the  Japanese  never  so  degenerated  : 
the  traditions  that  compelled  self-denial  and  obedi 
ence,  also  cultivated  courage,  and  insisted  upon 
cheerfulness.  The  power  of  the  ruler  was  unlimited 
because  the  power  of  all  the  dead  supported  hirnu  ^ 
"  Laws,"  says  Herbert  Spencer,  "  whether  written 
or  unwritten,  formulate  the  rule  of  the  dead  over  the 
living.  In  addition  to  that  power  which  past  gen 
erations  exercise  over  present  generations,  by  trans- 


200  THE   RULE   OF   THE   DEAD 

mitring  their  natures,  — bodily  and  mental,  —  and  in 
addition  to  the  power  they  exercise  over  them  by 
bequeathed  habits  and  modes  of  life,  —  there  is  the 
power  they  exercise  through  their  regulations  for  pub 
lic  conduct,  handed  down  orally,  or  in  writing.  .  .  . 
I  emphasize  these  truths,"  -  he  adds,  — "  for  the 
purpose  of  showing  that  they  imply  a  tacit  ancestor- 
worship."  .  .  .  Of  no  other  laws  in  the  history  of 
human  civilization  are  these  observations  more  true 
than  of  the  laws  of  Old  Japan.  Most  strikingly 
did  they  "  formulate  the  rule  of  the  dead  over  the 
living."  And  the  hand  of  the  dead  was  heavy :  it  is 
heavy  upon  the  living  even  to-day. 


The  Introduction  of  Buddhism 


The   Introduction   of  Buddhism 

THE  nature  of  the  opposition  which  the 
ancient  religion  of  Japan  could  offer  to  the 
introduction  of  any  hostile  alien  creed, 
should  now  be  obvious.  The  family  being  founded 
upon  ancestor-worship,  the  commune  being  regu 
lated  by  ancestor-worship,  the  clan-group  or  tribe 
being  governed  by  ancestor-worship,  and  the  Su 
preme  Ruler  being  at  once  the  high-priest  and 
deity  of  an  ancestral  cult  which  united  all  the  other 
cults  in  one  common  tradition,  it  must  be  evident 
that  the  promulgation  of  any  religion  essentially 
opposed  to  Shinto  would  have  signified  nothingv 
less  than  an  attack  upon  the  whole  system  of 
society.  Considering  these  circumstances,  it  may 
well  seem  strange  that  Buddhism  should  have  suc 
ceeded,  after  some  preliminary  struggles  (which  in 
cluded  one  bloody  battle),  in  getting  itself  accepted 
as  a  second  national  faith.  But  although  the  origi 
nal  Buddhist  doctrine  was  essentially  in  disaccord 
with  Shinto  beliefs,  Buddhism  had  learned  in 
India,  in  China,  in  Korea,  and  in  divers  adjacent 
countries,  how  to  meet  the  spiritual  needs  of  peo 
ples  maintaining  a  persistent  ancestor-worship.  In- 

203 


204     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

tolerance  of  ancestor-worsnip  would  have  long  ago 
resulted  in  the  extinction  of  Buddhism ;  for  its 
vast  conquests  have  all  been  made  among  ancestor- 
worshipping  races.  Neither  in  India  nor  in  China 
nor  in  Korea,  —  neither  in  Siam  nor  Burmah  nor 
Annam, —  did  it  attempt  to  extinguish  ancestor- 
worship.  Everywhere  it  made  itself  accepted  as 
an  ally,  nowhere  as  an  enemy,  of  social  custom. 
In  Japan  it  adopted  the  same  policy  which  had 
secured  its  progress  on  the  continent ;  and  in  order 
to  form  any  clear  conception  of  Japanese  religious 
conditions,  this  fact  must  be  kept  in  mind. 

As  the  oldest  extant  Japanese  texts  —  with  the 
probable  exception  of  some  Shint5  rituals  —  date 
from  the  eighth  century,  it  is  only  possible  to  sur 
mise  the  social  conditions  of  that  earlier  epoch  in 
which  there  was  no  form  of  religion  but  ancestor- 
worship.  Only  by  imagining  the  absence  of  all 
Chinese  and  Korean  influences,  can  we  form 
some  vague  idea  of  the  state  of  things  which  existed 
during  the  so-called  Age  of  the  Gods,  —  and  it  is 
difficult  to  decide  at  what  period  these  influences 
began  to  operate.  Confucianism  appears  to  have 
preceded  Buddhism  by  a  considerable  interval ;  and 
its  progress,  as  an  organizing  power,  was  much 
more  rapid.  Buddhism  was  first  introduced  from 
Korea,  about  552  A.D.  ;  but  the  mission  accom 
plished  little.  By  the  end  of  the  eighth  century 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     205 

the  whole  fabric  of  Japanese  administration  had  been 
reorganized  upon  the  Chinese  plan,  under  Confucian 
influence ;  but  it  was  not  until  well  into  the  ninth 
century  that  Buddhism  really  began  to  spread 
throughout  the  country.  Eventually  it  over 
shadowed  the  national  life,  and  coloured  all  the 
national  thought.  Yet  the  extraordinary  conserva 
tism  of  the  ancient  ancestor-cult  —  its  inherent 
power  of  resisting  fusion  —  was  exemplified  by  the 
readiness  with  which  the  two  religions  fell  apart  on 
the  disestablishment  of  Buddhism  in  1871.  After 
having  been  literally  overlaid  by  Buddhism  for 
nearly  a  thousand  years,  Shinto  immediately  re- 
assumed  its  archaic  simplicity,  and  reestablished 
the  unaltered  forms  of  its  earliest  rites. 

But  the  attempt  of  Buddhism  to  absorb  Shinto 
seemed  at  one  period  to  have  almost  succeeded. 
The  method  of  the  absorption  is  said  to  have  been 
devised,  about  the  year  800,  by  the  famous  founder 
of  the  Shingon  sect,  Kukai  or  "  Kobodaishi " 
(as  he  is  popularly  called),  who  first  declared  the 
higher  Shinto  gods  to  be  incarnations  of  various 
Buddhas.  But  in  this  matter,  of  course,  K6b5daishi 
was  merely  following  precedents  of  Buddhist  policy. 
Under  the  name  of  Ryobu-ShintS,1  the  new  com 
pound  of  Shinto  and  Buddhism  obtained  imperial 
approval  and  support.  Thereafter,  in  hundreds  of 

1  The  term  "  Ryobu  "  signifies  "two-departments"  or  "two  religions." 


206     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

places,  the  two  religions  were  domiciled  within  the 
same  precinct  —  sometimes  even  within  the  same 
building :  they  seemed  to  have  been  veritably 
amalgamated.  And  nevertheless  there  was  no 
real  fusion  ;  —  after  ten  centuries  of  such  contact 
they  separated  again,  as  lightly  as  if  they  had  never 
touched.  It  was  only  in  the  domestic  form  of  the 
ancestor-cult  that  Buddhism  really  affected  perma 
nent  modifications ;  yet  even  these  were  neither 
fundamental  nor  universal.  In  certain  provinces 
they  were  not  made ;  and  almost  everywhere  a  con 
siderable  part  of  the  population  preferred  to  follow 
the  Shint5  form  of  the  ancestor-cult.  Yet  another 
large  class  of  persons,  converts  to  Buddhism,  con 
tinued  to  profess  the  older  creed  as  well ;  and,  while 
practising  their  ancestor-worship  according  to  the 
Buddhist  rite,  maintained  separately  also  the  domes 
tic  worship  of  the  elder  gods.  In  most  Japanese 
houses  to-day,  the  "god-shelf"  and  the  Buddhist 
shrine  can  both  be  found;  both  cults  being  main 
tained  under  the  same  roof.1  .  .  .  But  I  am  men 
tioning  these  facts  only  as  illustrating  the  conservative 
vitality  of  Shint5,  not  as  indicating  any  weakness 
in  the  Buddhist  propaganda.  Unquestionably  the 
influence  which  Buddhism  exerted  upon  Japanese 

1  The  ancestor- worship  and  the  funeral  rites  are  Buddhist,  as  a  general  rule,  if 
the  family  be  Buddhist  5  but  the  Shinto  gods  are  also  worshipped  in  most  Buddhist 
households,  except  those  attached  to  the  Shin  sect.  Many  followers  of  even  the 
Shin  sect,  however,  appear  to  follow  the  ancient  religion  likewise ;  and  they  have 
their  Ujigami. 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     207 

civilization  was  immense,  profound,  multiform, 
incalculable ;  and  the  only  wonder  is  that  it  should 
not  have  been  able  to  stifle  Shint5  forever.  To 
state,  as  various  writers  have  carelessly  stated,  that 
Buddhism  became  the  popular  religion,  while  Shinto 
remained  the  official  religion,  is  altogether  mis 
leading.  As  a  matter  of  fact  Buddhism  became  as 
much  an  official  religion  as  Shinto  itself,  and  in 
fluenced  the  lives  of  the  highest  classes  not  less  than 
the  lives  of  the  poor.  It  made  monks  of  Emperors, 
and  nuns  of  their  daughters  ;  it  decided  the  conduct 
of  rulers,  the  nature  of  decrees,  and  the  administra 
tion  of  laws.  In  every  community  the  Buddhist 
parish-priest  was  a  public  official  as  well  as  a  spirit 
ual  teacher :  he  kept  the  parish  register,  and  made 
report  to  the  authorities  upon  local  matters  of 
importance. 

By  introducing  the  love  of  learning,  Confucianism 
had  partly  prepared  the  way  for  Buddhism.  As 
early  even  as  the  first  century  there  were  some 
Chinese  scholars  in  Japan ;  but  it  was  toward  the 
close  of  the  third  century  that  the  study  of  Chinese 
literature  first  really  became  fashionable  among  the 
ruling  classes.  Confucianism,  however,  did  not 
represent  a  new  religion :  it  was  a  system  of  ethical 
teachings  founded  upon  an  ancestor-worship  much 
like  that  of  Japan.  What  it  had  to  offer  was  a 
kind  of  social  philosophy,  —  an  explanation  of  the 


208     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

eternal  reason  of  things.  It  reinforced  and  expanded 
the  doctrine  of  filial  piety ;  it  regulated  and  elabo 
rated  preexisting  ceremonial ;  and  it  systematized  all 
the  ethics  of  government.  In  the  education  of  the 
ruling  classes  it  became  a  great  power,  and  has  so 
remained  down  to  the  present  day.  Its  doctrines 
were  humane,  in  the  best  meaning  of  the  word  ;  and 
striking  evidence  of  its  humanizing  effect  on  govern 
ment  policy  may  be  found  in  the  laws  and  the 
maxims  of  that  wisest  of  Japanese  rulers  —  lyeyasu. 
But  the  religion  of  the  Buddha  brought  to  Japan 
another  and  a  wider  humanizing  influence,  —  a  new 
gospel  of  tenderness,  — together  with  a  multitude  of 
new  beliefs  that  were  able  to  accommodate  them 
selves  to  the  old,  in  spite  of  fundamental  dissimi 
larity.  In  the  highest  meaning  of  the  term,  it  was  a 
civilizing  power.  Besides  teaching  new  respect  for 
life,  the  duty  of  kindness  to  animals  as  well  as  to  all 
human  beings,  the  consequence  of  present  acts  upon 
the  conditions  of  a  future  existence,  the  duty  of  res 
ignation  to  pain  as  the  inevitable  result  of  forgotten 
error,  it  actually  gave  to  Japan  the  arts  and  the 
industries  of  China.  Architecture,  painting,  sculp 
ture,  engraving,  printing,  gardening  —  in  short, 
every  art  and  industry  that  helped  to  make  life 
beautiful — developed  first  in  Japan  under  Buddhist 
teaching. 

There  are    many    forms    of  Buddhism;    and    in 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     209 

modern  Japan  there  are  twelve  principal  Buddhist 
sects  ;  but,  for  present  purposes,  it  will  be  enough 
to  speak,  in  the  most  general  way,  of  popular 
Buddhism  only,  as  distinguished  from  philosophical 
Buddhism,  which  I  shall  touch  upon  in  a  subsequent 
chapter.  The  higher  Buddhism  could  not,  at  any 
time  or  in  any  country,  have  had  a  large  popular 
following;  and  it  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  its 
particular  doctrines  —  such  as  the  doctrine  of  Nir 
vana —  were  taught  to  the  common  people.  Only 
such  forms  of  doctrine  were  preached  as  could  be 
made  intelligible  and  attractive  to  very  simple 
minds.  There  is  a  Buddhist  proverb :  "  First  ob 
serve  the  person  ;  then  preach  the  Law," — that  is  to 
say,  Adapt  your  instruction  to  the  capacity  of  the 
listener.  In  Japan,  as  in  China,  Buddhism  had  to 
adapt  its  instruction  to  the  mental  capacity  of  large 
classes  of  people  yet  unaccustomed  to  abstract  ideas. 
Even  to  this  day  the  masses  do  not  know  so  much 
as  the  meaning  of  the  word  "Nirvana"  (Nehan) :  they 
have  been  taught  only  the  simpler  forms  of  the  reli 
gion  ;  and  in  dwelling  upon  these,  it  will  be  needless 
to  consider  differences  of  sect  and  dogma. 

To  appreciate  the  direct  influence  of  Buddhist 
teaching  upon  the  minds  of  the  common  people,  we 
must  remember  that  in  Shint5  there  was  no  doctrine 
of  metempsychosis.  As  I  have  said  before,  the 
spirits  of  the  dead,  according  to  ancient  Japanese 
thinking,  continued  to  exist  in  the  world :  they 


210    THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

mingled  somehow  with  the  viewless  forces  of  nature, 
and  acted  through  them.  Everything  happened  by 
the  agency  of  these  spirits  —  evil  or  good.  Those 
who  had  been  wicked  in  life  remained  wicked  after 
death ;  those  who  had  been  good  in  life  became 
good  gods  after  death ;  but  all  were  to  be  propi 
tiated.  No  idea  of  future  reward  or  punishment 
existed  before  the  coming  of  Buddhism  :  there  was 
no  notion  of  any  heaven  or  hell.  The  happiness 
of  ghosts  and  gods  alike  was  supposed  to  depend 
upon  the  worship  and  the  offerings  of  the  living. 
With  these  ancient  beliefs  Buddhism  attempted 
to  interfere  only  by  expanding  and  expounding  them, 
—  by  interpreting  them  in  a  totally  new  light. 
Modifications  were  effected,  but  no  suppressions : 
we  might  even  say  that  Buddhism  accepted  the 
whole  body  of  the  old  beliefs.  It  was  true,  the  new 
teaching  declared,  that  the  dead  continued  to  exist 
invisibly ;  and  it  was  not  wrong  to  suppose  that 
they  became  divinities,  since  all  of  them  were  des 
tined,  sooner  or  later,  to  enter  upon  the  way  to 
Buddhahood  —  the  divine  condition.  Buddhism  ac 
knowledged  likewise  the  greater  gods  of  Shinto,  with 
all  their  attributes  and  dignities,  —  declaring  them 
incarnations  of  Buddhas  or  Bodhisattvas :  thus  the 
goddess  of  the  sun  was  identified  with  Dai-Nichi- 
Nyorai  (the  Tathagata  Mahavairokana) ;  the  deity 
Hachiman  was  identified  with  Amida  (Amitabha). 
Nor  did  Buddhism  deny  the  existence  of  goblins 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     211 

and  evil  gods  :  these  were  identified  with  the  Pretas 
and  the  Marakayikas ;  and  the  Japanese  popular 
term  for  goblin,  Afa,  to-day  reminds  us  of  this  iden 
tification.  As  for  wicked  ghosts,  they  were  to  be 
thought  of  as  Pretas  only,  —  Gaki,  —  self-doomed  by 
the  errors  of  former  lives  to  the  Circle  of  Perpetual 
Hunger.  The  ancient  sacrifices  to  the  various  gods 
of  disease  and  pestilence  —  gods  of  fever,  small-pox, 
dysentery,  consumption,  coughs,  and  colds — were 
continued  with  Buddhist  approval ;  but  converts 
were  bidden  to  consider  such  maleficent  beings  as 
Pretas,  and  to  present  them  with  only  such  food- 
offerings  as  are  bestowed  upon  Pretas  —  not  for 
propitiation,  but  for  the  purpose  of  relieving  ghostly 
pain.  In  this  case,  as  in  the  case  of  the  ancestral 
spirits,  Buddhism  prescribed  that  the  prayers  to  be 
repeated  were  to  be  said  for  the  sake  of  the  haunters, 
rather  than  to  them.  .  .  .  The  reader  may  be  re 
minded  of  the  fact  that  Roman  Catholicism,  by 
making  a  similar  provision,  still  practically  tolerates 
a  continuance  of  the  ancient  European  ancestor- 
worship.  And  we  cannot  consider  that  worship 
extinct  in  any  of  those  Western  countries  where  the 
peasants  still  feast  their  dead  upon  the  Night  of  All 
Souls. 

Buddhism,  however,  did  more  than  tolerate  the 
old  rites.  It  cultivated  and  elaborated  them. 
Under  its  teaching  a  new  and  beautiful  form  of 
the  domestic  cult  came  into  existence ;  and  all  the 


212     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

touching  poetry  of  ancestor-worship  in  modern 
Japan  can  be  traced  to  the  teaching  of  the  Buddh 
ist  missionaries.  Though  ceasing  to  regard  their 
dead  as  gods  in  the  ancient  sense,  the  Japanese  con 
verts  were  encouraged  to  believe  in  their  presence, 
and  to  address  them  in  terms  of  reverence  and 
affection.  It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  the  doctrine 
of  Pretas  gave  new  force  to  the  ancient  fear  of 
neglecting  the  domestic  rites.  Ghosts  unloved 
might  not  become  "  evil  gods  "  in  the  Shintd  mean 
ing  of  the  term ;  but  the  malevolent  Gaki  was  even 
more  to  be  dreaded  than  the  malevolent  Kami,  — 
for  Buddhism  defined  in  appalling  ways  the  nature 
of  the  Gakts  power  to  harm.  In  various  Buddhist 
funeral-rites,  the  dead  are  actually  addressed  as 
Gakz,  —  beings  to  be  pitied  but  also  to  be  feared,  — 
much  needing  human  sympathy  and  succour,  but 
able  to  recompense  the  food-giver  by  ghostly  help. 

One  particular  attraction  of  Buddhist  teaching 
was  its  simple  and  ingenious  interpretation  of 
nature.  Countless  matters  which  Shinto  had  never 
attempted  to  explain,  and  could  not  have  explained, 
Buddhism  expounded  in  detail,  with  much  apparent 
consistency.  Its  explanations  of  the  mysteries  of 
birth,  life,  and  death  were  at  once  consoling  to  pure 
minds,  and  wholesomely  discomforting  to  bad  con 
sciences.  It  taught  that  the  dead  were  happy  or 
unhappy  not  directly  because  of  the  attention  or  the 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     213 

neglect  shown  them  by  the  living,  but  because  of  their 
past  conduct  while  in  the  body.1  It  did  not  attempt 
to  teach  the  higher  doctrine  of  successive  rebirths,  — 
which  the  people  could  not  possibly  have  under 
stood, —  but  the  merely  symbolic  doctrine  of  trans 
migration,  which  everybody  could  understand.  To 
die  was  not  to  melt  back  into  nature,  but  to  be  re 
incarnated  ;  and  the  character  of  the  new  body,  as 
well  as  the  conditions  of  the  new  existence,  would 
depend  upon  the  quality  of  one's  deeds  and  thoughts 
in  the  present  body.  All  states  and  conditions  of 
being  were  the  consequence  of  past  actions.  Such 
a  man  was  now  rich  and  powerful,  because  in  pre 
vious  lives  he  had  been  generous  and  kindly  ;  such 
another  man  was  now  sickly  and  poor,  because  in  some 
previous  existence  he  had  been  sensual  and  selfish. 
This  woman  was  happy  in  her  husband  and  her 
children,  because  in  the  time  of  a  former  birth  she 
had  proved  herself  a  loving  daughter  and  a  faithful 
spouse ;  this  other  was  wretched  and  childless, 
because  in  some  anterior  existence  she  had  been  a 
jealous  wife  and  a  cruel  mother.  "To  hate  your 
enemy,"  the  Buddhist  preacher  would  proclaim,  "  is 

1  The  reader  will  doubtless  wonder  how  Buddhism  could  reconcile  its  doctrine  of 
successive  rebirths  with  the  ideas  of  ancestor-worship.  If  one  died  only  to  be  born 
again,  what  could  be  the  use  of  offering  food  or  addressing  any  kind  of  prayer  to  the 
reincarnated  spirit  ?  This  difficulty  was  met  by  the  teaching  that  the  dead  were  not 
immediately  reborn  in  most  cases,  but  entered  into  a  particular  condition  called  Cbu-  U. 
They  might  remain  in  this  disembodied  condition  for  the  time  of  one  hundred  years, 
after  which  they  were  reincarnated.  The  Buddhist  services  for  the  dead  are  conse 
quently  limited  to  the  time  of  one  hundred  years. 


2i4     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

foolish  as  well  as  wrong:  he  is  now  your  enemy 
only  because  of  some  treachery  that  you  practised 
upon  him  in  a  previous  life,  when  he  desired  to  be 
your  friend.  Resign  yourself  to  the  injury  which 
he  now  does  you :  accept  it  as  the  expiation  of  your 
forgotten  fault.  .  .  .  The  girl  whom  you  hoped  to 
marry  has  been  refused  you  by  her  parents,  —  given 
away  to  another.  But  once,  in  another  existence, 
she  was  yours  by  promise ;  and  you  broke  the 
pledge  then  given.  .  .  .  Painful  indeed  the  loss 
of  your  child ;  but  this  loss  is  the  consequence  of 
having,  in  some  former  life,  refused  affection  where 
affection  was  due.  .  .  .  Maimed  by  mishap,  you 
can  no  longer  earn  your  living  as  before.  Yet  this 
mishap  is  really  due  to  the  fact  that  in  some  pre 
vious  existence  you  wantonly  inflicted  bodily  injury. 
Now  the  evil  of  your  own  act  has  returned  upon 
you  :  repent  of  your  crime,  and  pray  that  its  Karma 
may  be  exhausted  by  this  present  suffering."  .  .  . 
All  the  sorrows  of  men  were  thus  explained  and 
consoled.  Life  was  expounded  as  representing  but 
one  stage  of  a  measureless  journey,  whose  way 
stretched  back  through  all  the  night  of  the  past, 
and  forward  through  all  the  mystery  of  the  future,  — 
out  of  eternities  forgotten  into  the  eternities  to  be ; 
and  the  world  itself  was  to  be  thought  of  only  as  a 
traveller's  resting-place,  an  inn  by  the  roadside. 

Instead  of  preaching  to  the  people  about  Nirvana, 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     215 

Buddhism  discoursed  to  them  of  blisses  to  be  won 
and  pains  to  be  avoided  :  the  Paradise  of  Amida, 
Lord  of  Immeasurable  Light :  the  eight  hot  hells 
called  To-kwatsu,  and  the  eight  icy  hells  called 
Abuda.  On  the  subject  of  future  punishment  the 
teaching  was  very  horrible :  I  should  advise  no  one 
of  delicate  nerves  to  read  the  Japanese,  or  rather  the 
Chinese  accounts  of  hell.  But  hell  was  the  penalty 
for  supreme  wickedness  only  :  it  was  not  eternal ;  and 
the  demons  themselves  would  at  last  be  saved.  .  .  . 
Heaven  was  to  be  the  reward  of  good  deeds :  the 
reward  might  indeed  be  delayed,  through  many 
successive  rebirths,  by  reason  of  lingering  Karma; 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  it  might  be  attained  by 
virtue  of  a  single  holy  act  in  this  present  life.  Be 
sides,  prior  to  the  period  of  supreme  reward,  each 
succeeding  rebirth  could  be  made  happier  than  the 
preceding  one  by  persistent  effort  in  the  holy  Way. 
Even  as  regarded  conditions  in  this  transitory  world, 
the  results  of  virtuous  conduct  were  not  to  be  de 
spised.  The  beggar  of  to-day  might  to-morrow  be 
reborn  in  the  palace  of  a  daimyo;  the  blind  shampooer 
might  become,  in  his  very  next  life,  an  imperial 
minister.  Always  the  recompense  would  be  pro 
portionate  to  the  sum  of  merit.  In  this  lower  world 
to  practise  the  highest  virtue  was  difficult ;  and  the 
great  rewards  were  hard  to  win.  But  for  all  good 
deeds  a  recompense  was  sure ;  and  there  was  no 
one  who  could  not  acquire  merit. 


2i6     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

Even  the  Shinto  doctrine  of  conscience  —  the 
god-given  sense  of  right  and  wrong  —  was  not 
denied  by  Buddhism.  But  this  conscience  was  in 
terpreted  as  the  essential  wisdom  of  the  Buddha  dor 
mant  in  every  human  creature, — wisdom  darkened 
by  ignorance,  clogged  by  desire,  fettered  by  Karma, 
but  destined  sooner  or  later  to  fully  awaken,  and  to 
flood  the  mind  with  light. 

It  would  seem 'that  the  Buddhist  teaching  of  the 
duty  of  kindness  to  all  living  creatures,  and  of  pity 
for  all  suffering,  had  a  powerful  effect  upon  national 
habit  and  custom,  long  before  the  new  religion  found 
general  acceptance.  As  early  as  the  year  675,  a 
decree  was  issued  by  the  Emperor  Temmu  for 
bidding  the  people  to  eat  "  the  flesh  of  kine,  horses, 
dogs,  monkeys,  or  barn-door  fowls,"  and  prohibiting 
the  use  of  traps  or  the  making  of  pitfalls  in  catching 
game.1  The  fact  that  all  kinds  of  flesh-meat 
were  not  forbidden  is  probably  explained  by  this 
Emperor's  zeal  for  the  maintenance  of  both  creeds  ; 
—  an  absolute  prohibition  might  have  interfered 
with  Shint5  usages,  and  would  certainly  have  been 
incompatible  with  Shinto  traditions.  But,  although 
fish  never  ceased  to  be  an  article  of  food  for  the 
laity,  we  may  say  that  from  about  this  time  the 
mass  of  the  nation  abandoned  its  habits  of  diet, 
and  forswore  the  eating  of  meat,  in  accordance  with 

1  See  Aston's  translation  of  the  Nibongi,  Vol.  II,  p.  328. 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     217 

Buddhist  teaching.  .  .  .  This  teaching  was  based 
upon  the  doctrine  of  the  unity  of  all  sentient  exist 
ence.  Buddhism  explained  the  whole  visible  world 
by  its  doctrine  of  Karma,  —  simplifying  that  doctrine 
so  as  to  adapt  it  to  popular  comprehension.  The 
forms  of  all  creatures,  —  bird,  reptile,  or  mammal; 
insect  or  fish,  —  represented  only  different  results  of 
Karma:  the  ghostly  life  in  each  was  one  and  the 
same ;  and,  in  even  the  lowest,  some  spark  of  the 
divine  existed.  The  frog  or  the  serpent,  the  bird 
or  the  bat,  the  ox  or  the  horse,  —  all  had  had,  at 
some  past  time,  the  privilege  of  human  (perhaps 
even  superhuman)  shape :  their  present  conditions 
represented  only  the  consequence  of  ancient  faults. 
Any  human  being  also,  by  reason  of  like  faults, 
might  hereafter  be  reduced  to  the  same  dumb  state, 
—  might  be  reborn  as  a  reptile,  a  fish,  a  bird,  or  a 
beast  of  burden.  The  consequence  of  wanton  cruelty 
to  any  animal  might  cause  the  perpetrator  of  that 
cruelty  to  be  reborn  as  an  animal  of  the  same  kind, 
destined  to  suffer  the  same  cruel  treatment.  Who 
could  even  be  sure  that  the  goaded  ox,  the  over 
driven  horse,  or  the  slaughtered  bird,  had  not 
formerly  been  a  human  being  of  closest  kin, — 
ancestor,  parent,  brother,  sister,  or  child  ?  .  .  . 

Not  by  words  only  were  all  these  things  taught. 
It  should  be  remembered  that  Shint5  had  no  art : 
its  ghost-houses,  silent  and  void,  were  not  even 


zi8     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

decorated.  But  Buddhism  brought  in  its  train  all 
the  arts  of  carving,  painting,  and  decoration.  The 
images  of  its  Bodhisattvas,  smiling  in  gold,  —  the 
figures  of  its  heavenly  guardians  and  infernal  judges, 
its  feminine  angels  and  monstrous  demons, — must 
have  startled  and  amazed  imaginations  yet  unaccus 
tomed  to  any  kind  of  art.  Great  paintings  hung  in  the 
temples,  and  frescoes  limned  upon  their  walls  or  ceil 
ings,  explained  better  than  words  the  doctrine  of  the 
Six  States  of  Existence,  and  the  dogma  of  future 
rewards  and  punishments.  In  rows  of  kakemono, 
suspended  side  by  side,  were  displayed  the  incidents 
of  a  Soul's  journey  to  the  realm  of  judgment,  and 
all  the  horrors  of  the  various  hells.  One  pictured 
the  ghosts  of  faithless  wives,  for  ages  doomed  to 
pluck,  with  bleeding  fingers,  the  rasping  bamboo- 
grass  that  grows  by  the  Springs  of  Death ;  another 
showed  the  torment  of  the  slanderer,  whose  tongue 
was  torn  by  demon-pincers ;  in  a  third  appeared 
the  spectres  of  lustful  men,  vainly  seeking  to  flee  the 
embraces  of  women  of  fire,  or  climbing,  in  frenzied 
terror,  the  slopes  of  the  Mountain  of  Swords.  Pic 
tured  also  were  the  circles  of  the  Preta-world,  and  the 
pangs  of  the  Hungry  Ghosts,  and  likewise  the  pains 
of  rebirth  in  the  form  of  reptiles  and  of  beasts.  And 
the  art  of  these  early  representations — many  of  which 
have  been  preserved  —  was  an  art  of  no  mean  order. 
We  can  hardly  conceive  the  effect  upon  inexperi 
enced  imagination  of  the  crimson  frown  of  Emma 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     219 

(Tama),  Judge  of  the  dead,  —  or  the  vision  of  that 
weird  Mirror  which  reflected  to  every  spirit  the  mis 
deeds  of  its  life  in  the  body,  —  or  the  monstrous 
fancy  of  that  double-faced  Head  before  the  judg 
ment  seat,  representing  the  visage  of  the  woman 
Mirume,  whose  eyes  behold  all  secret  sin ;  and  the 
vision  of  the  man  Kaguhana,  who  smells  all  odours 
of  evil-doing.  .  .  .  Parental  affection  must  have 
been  deeply  touched  by  the  painted  legend  of  the 
world  of  children's  ghosts,  —  the  little  ghosts  that 
must  toil,  under  demon-surveillance,  in  the  Dry  Bed 
of  the  River  of  Souls.  .  .  .  But  pictured  terrors 
were  offset  by  pictured  consolations, —by  the  beau 
tiful  figure  of  Kwannon,  white  Goddess  of  Mercy, 
—  by  the  compassionate  smile  of  Jiz5,  the  playmate 
of  infant-ghosts,  —  by  the  charm  also  of  celestial 
nymphs,  floating  on  iridescent  wings  in  light  of 
azure.  The  Buddhist  painter  opened  to  simple 
fancy  the  palaces  of  heaven,  and  guided  hope, 
through  gardens  of  jewel-trees,  even  to  the  shores 
of  that  lake  where  the  souls  of  the  blessed  are 
reborn  in  lotos-blossoms,  and  tended  by  angel- 
nurses. 

Moreover,  for  people  accustomed  only  to  such 
simple  architecture  as  that  of  the  Shinto  miyay  the 
new  temples  erected  by  the  Buddhist  priests  must 
have  been  astonishments.  The  colossal  Chinese 
gates,  guarded  by  giant  statues ;  the  lions  and 
lanterns  of  bronze  and  stone ;  the  enormous  sus- 


220     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

pended  bells,  sounded  by  swinging- beams ;  the 
swarming  of  dragon-shapes  under  the  eaves  of  the 
vast  roofs  ;  the  glimmering  splendour  of  the  altars  ; 
the  ceremonial  likewise,  with  its  chanting  and  its 
incense-burning  and  its  weird  Chinese  music, — 
cannot  have  failed  to  inspire  the  wonder-loving 
with  delight  and  awe.  It  is  a  noteworthy  fact  that 
the  earliest  Buddhist  temples  in  Japan  still  remain, 
even  to  Western  eyes,  the  most  impressive.  The 
Temple  of  the  Four  Deva  Kings  at  Osaka  —  which, 
though  more  than  once  rebuilt,  preserves  the  orig 
inal  plan  —  dates  from  600  A.D.  ;  the  yet  more 
remarkable  temple  called  Horyuji,  near  Nara,  dates 
from  about  the  year  607. 

Of  course  the  famous  paintings  and  the  great 
statues  could  be  seen  at  the  temples  only ;  but  the 
Buddhist  image-makers  soon  began  to  people  even 
the  most  desolate  places  with  stone  images  of 
Buddhas  and  of  Bodhisattvas.  Then  first  were 
made  those  icons  of  Jiz5,  which  still  smile  upon 
the  traveller  from  every  roadside,  —  and  the  images 
of  Koshin,  protector  of  highways,  with  his  three 
symbolic  Apes,  —  and  the  figure  of  that  Bato- 
Kwannon,  who  protects  the  horses  of  the  peasant, 
—  with  other  figures  in  whose  rude  but  impressive 
art  suggestions  of  Indian  origin  are  yet  recognizable. 
Gradually  the  graveyards  became  thronged  with 
dreaming  Buddhas  or  Bodhisattvas,  —  holy  guar 
dians  of  the  dead,  throned  upon  lotos-flowers  of 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     221 

stone,  and  smiling  with  closed  eyes  the  smile  of  the 
Calm  Supreme.  In  the  cities  everywhere  Buddhist 
sculptors  opened  shops,  to  furnish  pious  households 
with  images  of  the  chief  divinities  worshipped  by 
the  various  Buddhist  sects ;  and  the  makers  of  ihai, 
or  Buddhist  mortuary  tablets,  as  well  as  the  makers 
of  household  shrines,  multiplied  and  prospered. 

Meanwhile  the  people  were  left  free  to  worship 
their  ancestors  according  to  either  creed ;  and  if  a 
majority  eventually  gave  preference  to  the  Buddhist 
rite,  this  preference  was  due  in  large  measure  to 
the  peculiar  emotional  charm  which  Buddhism  had 
infused  into  the  cult.  Except  in  minor  details,  the 
two  rites  differed  scarcely  at  all ;  and  there  was  no 
conflict  whatever  between  the  old  ideas  of  filial  piety 
and  the  Buddhist  ideas  attaching  to  the  new  ancestor- 
worship.  Buddhism  taught  that  the  dead  might  be 
helped  and  made  happier  by  prayer,  and  that  much 
ghostly  comfort  could  be  given  them  by  food- 
offerings.  They  were  not  to  be  offered  flesh  or 
wine ;  but  it  was  proper  to  gratify  them  with  fruits 
and  rice  and  cakes  and  flowers  and  the  smoke  of 
incense.  Besides,  even  the  simplest  food-offerings 
might  be  transmuted,  by  force  of  prayer,  into  celes 
tial  nectar  and  ambrosia.  But  what  especially 
helped  the  new  ancestor-cult  to  popular  favour, 
was  the  fact  that  it  included  many  beautiful  and 
touching  customs  not  known  to  the  old.  Everywhere 


222     THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

the  people  soon  learned  to  kindle  the  hundred  and 
eight  fires  of  welcome  for  the  annual  visit  of  their 
dead,  —  to  supply  the  spirits  with  little  figures  made 
of  straw,  or  made  out  of  vegetables,  to  serve  for 
oxen  or  horses,1  —  also  to  prepare  the  ghost-ships 
(shoryobune\  in  which  the  souls  of  the  ancestors 
were  to  return,  over  the  sea,  to  their  under-world. 
Then  too  were  instituted  the  Bon-odori>  or  Dances 
of  the  Festival  of  the  Dead,2  and  the  custom  of 
suspending  white  lanterns  at  graves,  and  coloured 
lanterns  at  house-gates,  to  light  the  coming  and 
the  going  of  the  visiting  dead. 

But  perhaps  the  greatest  value  of  Buddhism  to 
the  nation  was  educational.  The  Shinto  priests 
were  not  teachers.  In  early  times  they  were  mostly 
aristocrats,  religious  representatives  of  the  clans ; 
and  the  idea  of  educating  the  common  people  could 
not  even  have  occurred  to  them.  Buddhism,  on 

1  An  eggplant,  with  four  pegs  of  wood  stuck  into  it,  to  represent  legs,  usually 
stands  for  an  ox  ;  and  a  cucumber,  with  four  pegs,  serves  for  a  horse.    .   .    .      One 
is  reminded  of  the  fact  that,  at  some  of  the  ancient  Greek  sacrifices,  similar  substi 
tutes  for  real  animals  were  used.     In  the  worship  of  Apollo,  at  Thebes,  apples  with 
wooden  pegs  stuck  into  them,  to  represent  feet  and  horns,  were  offered  as  substi 
tutes  for  sheep. 

2  The  dances    themselves  —  very  curious    and  very  attractive  to  witness  —  are 
much   older  than  Buddhism  ;  but    Buddhism  made   them  a  feature  of  the    festi 
val  referred  to,  which  lasts  for  three  days.     No  person  who  has  not  witnessed  a 
Bon-odori  can  form  the  least  idea  of  what  Japanese  dancing  means  :  it  is  something 
utterly  different  from  what  usually  goes  by  the  name,  —  something  indescribably 
archaic,  weird,   and  nevertheless  fascinating.      I  have  repeatedly  sat  up  all  night  to 
watch  the  peasants  dancing.     Japanese  dancing  girls,  be  it  observed,  do  not  dance  J 
they  pose.     The  peasants  dance. 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     223 

the  other  hand,  offered  the  boon  of  education  to 
all,  —  not  merely  a  religious  education,  but  an  edu 
cation  in  the  arts  and  the  learning  of  China.  The 
Buddhist  temples  eventually  became  common 
schools,  or  had  schools  attached  to  them ;  and  at 
each  parish  temple  the  children  of  the  community 
were  taught,  at  a  merely  nominal  cost,  the  doctrines 
of  the  faith,  the  wisdom  of  the  Chinese  classics,  cal 
ligraphy,  drawing,  and  much  besides.  By  degrees 
the  education  of  almost  the  whole  nation  came 
under  Buddhist  control ;  and  the  moral  effect  was 
of  the  best.  For  the  military  class  indeed  there 
was  another  and  special  system  of  education ;  but 
Samurai  scholars  sought  to  perfect  their  knowledge 
under  Buddhist  teachers  of  renown ;  and  the  impe 
rial  household  itself  employed  Buddhist  instructors. 
For  the  common  people  everywhere  the  Buddhist 
priest  was  the  schoolmaster ;  and  by  virtue  of  his 
occupation  as  teacher,  not  less  than  by  reason  of  his 
religious  office,  he  ranked  with  the  samurai.  Much 
of  what  remains  most  attractive  in  Japanese  charac 
ter  —  the  winning  and  graceful  aspects  of  it  —  seems 
to  have  been  developed  under  Buddhist  training. 

It  was  natural  enough  that  to  his  functions  of 
public  instructor,  the  Buddhist  priest  should  have 
added  those  of  a  public  registrar.  Until  the  period 
of  disendowment,  the  Buddhist  clergy  remained, 
throughout  the  country,  public  as  well  as  religious 
officials.  They  kept  the  parish  records,  and  fur- 


L 


224    THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM 

nished  at  need  certificates  of  birth,  death,  or  family 
descent. 

To  give  any  just  conception  of  the  immense 
civilizing  influence  which  Buddhism  exerted  in 
Japan  would  require  many  volumes.  Even  to 
summarize  the  results  of  that  influence  by  stating 
only  the  most  general  facts,  is  scarcely  possible,  — 
for  no  general  statement  can  embody  the  whole 
truth  of  the  work  accomplished.  As  a  moral  force, 
Buddhism  strengthened  authority  and  cultivated 
submission,  by  its  capacity  to  inspire  larger  hopes 
and  fears  than  the  more  ancient  religion  could  cre 
ate.  As  teacher,  it  educated  the  race,  from  the 
highest  to  the  humblest,  both  in  ethics  and  in 
esthetics.  All  that  can  be  classed  under  the  name 
of  art  in  Japan  was  either  introduced  or  developed 
by  Buddhism  ;  and  the  same  may  be  said  regarding 
nearly  all  Japanese  literature  possessing  real  literary 
quality,  —  excepting  some  Shinto  rituals,  and  some 
fragments  of  archaic  poetry.  Buddhism  introduced 
drama,  the  higher  forms  of  poetical  composition, 
and  fiction,  and  history,  and  philosophy.  All  the 
refinements  of  Japanese  life  were  of  Buddhist  intro 
duction,  and  at  least  a  majority  of  its  diversions  and 
pleasures.  There  is  even  to-day  scarcely  one  inter 
esting  or  beautiful  thing,  produced  in  the  country, 
for  which  the  nation  is  not  in  some  sort  indebted  to 
Buddhism.  Perhaps  the  best  and  briefest  way  of 


THE  INTRODUCTION  OF  BUDDHISM     225 

stating  the  range  of  such  indebtedness,  is  simply  tov 
say  that  Buddhism  brought  the  whole  of  Chinese 
civilization  into  Japan,  and  thereafter  patiently 
modified  and  reshaped  it  to  Japanese  requirements. 
The  elder  civilization  was  not  merely  superimposed 
upon  the  social  structure,  but  fitted  carefully  into  it, 
combined  with  it  so  perfectly  that  the  marks  of  the 
welding,  the  lines  of  the  juncture,  almost  totally 
disappeared. 


The   Higher    Buddhism 


The   Higher   Buddhism 

PHILOSOPHICAL  Buddhism  requires  some 
brief  consideration  in  this  place,  —  for  two 
reasons.  The  first  is  that  misapprehension 
or  ignorance  of  the  subject  has  rendered  possible  the 
charge  of  atheism  against  the  intellectual  classes  of 
Japan.  The  second  reason  is  that  some  persons 
imagine  the  Japanese  common  people  —  that  is  to 
say,  the  greater  part  of  the  nation  —  believers  in  the 
doctrine  of  Nirvana  as  extinction  (though,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  even  the  meaning  of  the  word  is 
unknown  to  the  masses),  and  quite  resigned  to 
vanish  from  the  face  of  the  earth,  because  of  that 
incapacity  for  struggle  which  the  doctrine  is  sup 
posed  to  create.  A  little  serious  thinking  ought 
to  convince  any  intelligent  man  that  no  such  creed 
could  ever  have  been  the  religion  of  either  a  savage 
or  a  civilized  people.  But  myriads  of  Western  minds 
are  ready  at  all  times  to  accept  statements  of  impos 
sibility  without  taking  the  trouble  to  think  about 
them  ;  and  if  I  can  show  some  of  my  readers  how 
far  beyond  popular  comprehension  the  doctrines 
of  the  higher  Buddhism  really  are,  something  will 
have  been  accomplished  for  the  cause  of  truth  and 

229 


230  THE   HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

common-sense.  And  besides  the  reasons  already 
given  for  dwelling  upon  the  subject,  there  is  this 
third  and  special  reason,  —  that  it  is  one  of  extraor 
dinary  interest  to  the  student  of  modern  philosophy. 

Before  going  further,  I  must  remind  you  that  the 
metaphysics  of  Buddhism  can  be  studied  anywhere 
else  quite  as  well  as  in  Japan,  since  the  more  impor 
tant  sutras  have  been  translated  into  various  European 
languages,  and  most  of  the  untranslated  texts  edited 
and  published.  The  texts  of  Japanese  Buddhism 
are  Chinese ;  and  only  Chinese  scholars  are  com 
petent  to  throw  light  upon  the  minor  special  phases 
of  the  subject.  Even  to  read  the  Chinese  Buddhist 
canon  of  7000  volumes  is  commonly  regarded  as 
an  impossible  feat,  —  though  it  has  certainly  been 
accomplished  in  Japan.  Then  there  are  the  com 
mentaries,  the  varied  interpretations  of  different 
sects,  the  multiplications  of  later  doctrine,  to  heap 
confusion  upon  confusion.  The  complexities  of 
Japanese  Buddhism  are  incalculable ;  and  those  who 
try  to  unravel  them  soon  become,  as  a  general  rule, 
hopelessly  lost  in  the  maze  of  detail.  All  this  has 
nothing  to  do  with  my  present  purpose.  I  shall 
have  very  little  to  say  about  Japanese  Buddhism 
as  distinguished  from  other  Buddhism,  and  nothing 
at  all  to  say  about  sect-differences.  I  shall  keep  to 
general  facts  as  regards  the  higher  doctrine,  —  select 
ing  from  among  such  facts  only  those  most  suitable 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  231 

for  the  illustration  of  that  doctrine.  And  I  shall 
not  take  up  the  subject  of  Nirvana,  in  spite  of  its 
great  importance,  —  having  treated  it  as  fully  as  I 
was  able  in  my  Gleanings  in  Buddha-Fields,  —  but 
confine  myself  to  the  topic  of  certain  analogies 
between  the  conclusions  of  Buddhist  metaphysics 
and  the  conclusions  of  contemporary  Western 
thought. 

In  the  best  single  volume  yet  produced  in  Eng 
lish  on  the  subject  of  Buddhism,1  the  late  Mr. 
Henry  Clarke  Warren  observed :  "  A  large  part  of 
the  pleasure  that  I  have  experienced  in  the  study 
of  Buddhism  has  arisen  from  what  I  may  call  the 
strangeness  of  the  intellectual  landscape.  All  the 
ideas,  the  modes  of  argument,  even  the  postulates 
assumed  and  not  argued  about,  have  always  seemed 
so  strange,  so  different  from  anything  to  which  I 
have  been  accustomed,  that  I  felt  all  the  time 
as  though  walking  in  Fairyland.  Much  of  the 
charm  that  the  Oriental  thoughts  and  ideas  have  for 
me  appears  to  be  because  they  so  seldom  fit  into 
Western  categories."  .  .  .  The  serious  attraction 
of  Buddhist  philosophy  could  not  be  better  sug 
gested  :  it  is  indeed  "  the  strangeness  of  the  intel 
lectual  landscape,"  as  of  a  world  inside-out  and 
upside-down,  that  has  chiefly  interested  Western 

1  Buddhism  in  Translations,  by  Henry  Clarke  Warren  (Cambridge,  Massa 
chusetts,  1896).  Published  by  Harvard  University. 


232  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

thinkers  heretofore.  Yet  after  all,  there  is  a  class  of 
Buddhist  concepts  which  can  be  fitted,  or  very 
nearly  fitted,  into  Western  categories.  The  higher 
Buddhism  is  a  kind  of  Monism ;  and  it  includes 
doctrines  that  accord,  in  the  most  surprising  manner, 
with  the  scientific  theories  of  the  German  and  the 
English  monists.  To  my  thinking,  the  most  curi 
ous  part  of  the  subject,  and  its  main  interest,  is 
represented  just  by  these  accordances, — particularly 
in  view  of  the  fact  that  the  Buddhist  conclusions 
have  been  reached  through  mental  processes  un 
known  to  Western  thinking,  and  unaided  by  any 
knowledge  of  science.  ...  I  venture  to  call  myself 
a  student  of  Herbert  Spencer;  and  it  was  because 
of  my  acquaintance  with  the  Synthetic  Philosophy 
that  I  came  to  find  in  Buddhist  philosophy  a  more 
than  romantic  interest.  For  Buddhism  is  also  a 
theory  of  evolution,  though  the  great  central  idea  of 
our  scientific  evolution  (the  law  of  progress  from 
homogeneity  to  heterogeneity)  is  not  correspondingly 
implied  by  Buddhist  doctrine  as  regards  the  life  of 
this  world.  The  course  of  evolution  as  we  conceive 
it,  according  to  Professor  Huxley,  "  must  describe  a 
trajectory  like  that  of  a  ball  fired  from  a  mortar ; 
and  the  sinking  half  of  that  course  is  as  much  a  part 
of  the  general  process  of  evolution  as  the  rising." 
The  highest  point  of  the  trajectory  would  represent 
what  Mr.  Spencer  calls  Equilibration,  —  the  su 
preme  point  of  development  preceding  the  period 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  233 

of  decline  ;  but,  in  Buddhist  evolution,  this  supreme 
point  vanishes  into  Nirvana.  I  can  best  illustrate 
the  Buddhist  position  by  asking  you  to  imagine  the 
trajectory  line  upside-down,  —  a  course  descending 
out  of  the  infinite,  touching  ground,  and  ascending 
again  to  mystery.  .  .  .  Nevertheless,  some  Buddhist 
ideas  do  offer  the  most  startling  analogy  with  the 
evolutional  ideas  of  our  own  time ;  and  even  those 
Buddhist  concepts  most  remote  from  Western 
thought  can  be  best  interpreted  by  the  help  of  illus 
trations  and  of  language  borrowed  from  modern 
science. 

I  think  that  we  may  consider  the  most  remarkable 
teachings    of    the     higher     Buddhism,  —  excluding 
the    doctrine  of    Nirvana,    for   the    reason   already 
given,  —  to  be  the  following  :  — 
That  there  is  but  one  Reality ;  — 
That  the  consciousness  is  not  the  real  Self;  — 
That  Matter  is  an  aggregate  of  phenomena  created 
by  the  force  of  acts  and  thoughts ;  — 

That  all  objective  and  subjective  existence  is  made  by 
Karma,  —  the  present  being  the  creation  of  the  past, 
and  the  actions  of  the  -present  and  the  past,  in  combi 
nation,  determining  the  conditions  of  the  future.  .  .  . 
(Or,  in  other  words,  that  the  universe  of  Matter, 
and  the  universe  of  [conditioned]  Mind,  represent 
in  their  evolution  a  strictly  moral  order.) 

It   will   be   worth  while  now  to  briefly  consider 


234  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

these  doctrines  in  their  relation  to  modern  thought, 

—  beginning  with  the  first,  which  is  Monism  :  — 

All  things  having  form  or  name, —  Buddhas, 
gods,  men,  and  all  living  creatures,  —  suns,  worlds, 
moons,  the  whole  visible  cosmos,  —  are  transitory 
phenomena.  .  .  .  Assuming,  with  Herbert  Spencer, 
that  the  test  of  reality  is  permanence,  one  can 
scarcely  question  this  position ;  it  differs  little 
from  the  statement  with  which  the  closing  chapter 
of  the  First  Principles  concludes  :  — 

"  Though  the  relation  of  subject  and  object  renders 
necessary  to  us  these  antithetical  conceptions  of  Spirit  and 
Matter,  the  one  is  no  less  than  the  other  to  be  regarded  as 
but  a  sign  of  the  Unknown  Reality  which  underlies  both."  — 
Edition  of  1894. 

For   Buddhism  the  sole  reality  is   the  Absolute, 

—  Buddha    as    unconditioned    and    Infinite  Being. 
There  is   no  other  veritable  existence,  whether  of 
Matter  or  of  Mind ;  there  is  no  real  individuality 
or   personality;     the    "I"    and    the  "  Not-I "  are 
essentially  nowise  different.     We  are  reminded  of 
Mr.  Spencer's  position,  that "  it  is  one  and  the  same 
Reality  which  is  manifested  to  us  both  subjectively 
and    objectively/'      Mr.    Spencer    goes  on  to  say : 
"  Subject  and  Object,  as  actually  existing,  can  never 
be   contained    in    the   consciousness  produced  by    the 
cooperation  of  the  two,  though  they  are  necessarily 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  235 

implied  by  it ;  and  the  antithesis  of  Subject  and 
Object,  never  to  be  transcended  while  consciousness 
Jasts,  renders  impossible  all  knowledge  of  that  Ulti 
mate  Reality  in  which  Subject  and  Object  are 
united.".  .  .  I  do  not  think  that  a  master  of  the 
higher  Buddhism  would  dispute  Mr.  Spencer's 
doctrine  of  Transfigured  Realism.  Buddhism  does 
not  deny  the  actuality  of  phenomena  as  phenomena, 
but  denies  their  permanence,  and  the  truth  of  the 
appearances  which  they  present  to  our  imperfect 
senses.  Being  transitory,  and  not  what  they  seem, 
they  are  to  be  considered  in  the  nature  of  illusions, 
—  impermanent  manifestations  of  the  only  per 
manent  Reality.  But  the  Buddhist  position  is  not 
agnosticism  :  it  is  astonishingly  different,  as  we  shall 
presently  see.  Mr.  Spencer  states  that  we  cannot 
know  the  Reality  so  long  as  consciousness  lasts,  — 
because  while  consciousness  lasts  we  cannot  transcend 
the  antithesis  of  Object  and  Subject,  and  it  is  this 
very  antithesis  which  makes  consciousness  possible. 
"  Very  true,"  the  Buddhist  metaphysician  would 
reply ;  £C  we  cannot  know  the  sole  Reality  while 
consciousness  lasts.  But  destroy  consciousness,  and 
the  Reality  becomes  cognizable.  Annihilate  the  illu 
sion  of  Mind,  and  the  light  will  come."  This  de 
struction  of  consciousness  signifies  Nirvana,  —  the 
extinction  of  all  that  we  call  Self.  Self  is  blindness  : 
destroy  it,  and  the  Reality  will  be  revealed  as 
infinite  vision  and  infinite  peace. 


236  THE    HIGHER    BUDDHISM 

We  have  now  to  ask  what,  according  to  Buddhist 
philosophy,  is  the  meaning  of  the  visible  universe 
as  phenomenon,  and  the  nature  of  the  consciousness 
that  perceives.  However  transitory,  the  phenome 
non  makes  an  impression  upon  consciousness ;  and 
consciousness  itself,  though  transitory,  has  existence  ; 
and  its  perceptions,  however  delusive,  are  percep 
tions  of  actual  relation.  Buddhism  answers  that 
both  the  universe  and  the  consciousness  are  merely 
aggregates  of  Karma  —  complexities  incalculable  of 
conditions  shaped  by  acts  and  thoughts  through 
some  enormous  past.  All  substance  and  all  condi 
tioned  mind  (as  distinguished  from  unconditioned 
mind)  are  products  of  acts  and  thoughts :  by  acts 
and  thoughts  the  atoms  of  bodies  have  been  inte 
grated  ;  and  the  affinities  of  those  atoms  —  the 
polarities  of  them,  as  a  scientist  might  say  —  rep 
resent  tendencies  shaped  in  countless  vanished  lives. 
I  may  quote  here  from  a  modern  Japanese  treatise 
on  the  subject :  — 

"  The  aggregate  actions  of  all  sentient  beings  give  birth 
to  the  varieties  of  mountains,  rivers,  countries,  etc.  They 
are  caused  by  aggregate  actions,  and  so  are  called  aggregate 
fruits.  Our  present  life  is  the  reflection  of  past  actions. 
Men  consider  these  reflections  as  their  real  selves.  Their 
eyes,  noses,  ears,  tongues,  and  bodies  —  as  well  as  their 
gardens,  woods,  farms,  residences,  servants,  and  maids  — 
men  imagine  to  be  their  own  possessions ;  but,  in  fact, 
they  are  only  results  endlessly  produced  by  innumerable 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  237 

actions.  In  tracing  every  thing  back  to  the  ultimate  limits 
of  the  past,  we  cannot  find  a  beginning :  hence  it  is  said 
that  death  and  birth  have  no  beginning.  Again,  when 
seeking  the  ultimate  limit  of  the  future,  we  cannot  find  the 
end."  i 

This  teaching  that  all  things  are  formed  by 
Karma  —  whatever  is  good  in  the  universe  repre 
senting  the  results  of  meritorious  acts  or  thoughts ; 
and  what  ever  is  evil,  the  results  of  evil  acts  or 
thoughts  —  has  the  approval  of  five  of  the  great 
sects ;  and  we  may  accept  it  as  a  leading  doctrine  of 
Japanese  Buddhism.  .  .  .  The  cosmos  is,  then,  an 
aggregate  of  Karma ;  and  the  mind  of  man  is  an 
aggregate  of  Karma ;  and  the  beginnings  thereof  are 
unknown,  and  the  end  cannot  be  imagined.  There 
is  a  spiritual  evolution,  of  which  the  goal  is  Nirvana ; 
but  we  have  no  declaration  as  to  a  final  state  of 
universal  rest,  when  the  shaping  of  substance  and  of 
mind  will  have  ceased  forever.  .  .  .  Now  the  Syn 
thetic  Philosophy  assumes  a  very  similar  position 
as  regards  the  evolution  of  phenomena :  there  is  no 
beginning  to  evolution,  nor  any  conceivable  end. 
I  quote  from  Mr.  Spencer's  reply  to  a  critic  in  the 
North  American  Review  :  - — • 

11  That  c  absolute  commencement  of  organic  life  upon 
the  globe,'  which  the  reviewer  says  I  c  cannot  evade 
the  admission  of,'  I  distinctly  deny.  The  affirmation  of 

1  Outlines  of  tbt  Mabayana  Philosophy t  by  S.  Kuroda. 


238  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

universal  evolution  is  in  itself  the  negation  of  an  absolute 
commencement  of  anything.  Construed  in  terms  of  evolu 
tion,  every  kind  of  being  is  conceived  as  a  product  of  modi 
fication  wrought  by  insensible  gradations  upon  a  preexisting 
kind  of  being ;  and  this  holds  as  fully  of  the  supposed 
'  commencement  of  organic  life  '  as  of  all  subsequent  devel 
opments  of  organic  life.  .  .  .  That  organic  matter  was 
not  produced  all  at  once,  but  was  reached  through  steps, 
we  are  well  warranted  in  believing  by  the  experiences  of 
chemists." l  .  .  . 

Of  course  it  should  be  understood  that  the  Buddh 
ist  silence,  as  to  a  beginning  and  an  end,  concerns 
only  the  production  of  phenomena,  not  any  particular 
existence  of  groups  of  phenomena.  That  of  which 
no  beginning  or  end  can  be  predicated  is  simply  the 
Eternal  Becoming.  And,  like  the  older  Indian 
philosophy  from  which  it  sprang,  Buddhism  teaches 
the  alternate  apparition  and  disparition  of  universes. 
At  certain  prodigious  periods  of  time,  the  whole 
cosmos  of  "  one  hundred  thousand  times  ten  mil 
lions  of  worlds"  vanishes  away,  —  consumed  by 
fire  or  otherwise  destroyed,  —  but  only  to  be  re 
formed  again.  These  periods  are  called  "  World- 
Cycles,"  and  each  World-Cycle  is  divided  into  four 
"  Immensities,"  —  but  we  need  not  here  consider 
the  details  of  the  doctrine.  It  is  only  the  funda 
mental  idea  of  a  evolutional  rhythm  that  is  really 
interesting.  I  need  scarcely  remind  the  reader  that 

1  Principle  of  Biology,  Vol.  I,  p.  48*. 


THE   HIGHER   BUDDHISM  239 

the  alternate  disintegration  and  reintegration  of  the 
cosmos  is  also  a  scientific  conception,  and  a  com 
monly  accepted  article  of  evolutional  belief.  I  may 
quote,  however,  for  other  reasons,  the  paragraph 
expressing  Herbert  Spencer's  views  upon  the  sub 
ject  :  — 

ct  Apparently  the  universally  coexistent  forces  of  attrac 
tion  and  repulsion,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  necessitate 
rhythm  in  all  minor  changes  throughout  the  Universe,  also 
necessitate  rhythm  in  the  totality  of  changes,  —  produce 
now  an  immeasurable  period  during  which  the  attractive 
forces,  predominating,  cause  universal  concentration  ;  and 
then  an  immeasurable  period  during  which  the  repulsive 
forces,  predominating,  cause  diffusion,  —  alternate  eras  of 
Evolution  and  Dissolution.  And  thus  there  is  suggested  to 
us  the  conception  of  a  past  during  which  there  have  been 
successive  Evolutions  analogous  to  that  which  is  now  going 
on  ;  and  a  future  during  which  successive  other  such  Evo 
lutions  may  go  on  —  ever  the  same  in  principle,  but  never 
the  same  in  concrete  result."  —  First  Principles^  § 


Further  on,  Mr.  Spencer  has  pointed  out  the  vast 
logical  consequence  involved  by  this  hypothesis  :  — 

"  If,  as  we  saw  reason  to  think,  there  is  an  alternation 
of  Evolution  and  Dissolution  in  the  totality  of  things,  — 
if,  as  we  are  obliged  to  infer  from  the  Persistence  of  Force, 
the  arrival  at  either  limit  of  this  vast  rhythm  brings  about 
the  conditions  under  which  a  counter-movement  commences, 

1  This  paragraph,  from  the  fourth  edition,  has  been  considerably  qualified  in  the 
definitive  edition  of  1900. 


240  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

. —  if  we  are  hence  compelled  to  entertain  the  conception  of 
Evolutions  that  have  filled  an  immeasurable  past,  and  Evolu 
tions  that  will  fill  an  immeasurable  future,  —  we  can  no  longer 
contemplate  the  visible  creation  as  having  a  definite  begin 
ning  or  end,  or  as  being  isolated.  It  becomes  unified  with 
all  existence  before  and  after;  and  the  Force  which  the 
Universe  presents  falls  into  the  same  category  with  its 
Space  and  Time  as  admitting  of  no  limitation  in  thought." l 
—  First  Principles,  §  190. 

The  foregoing  Buddhist  positions  sufficiently 
imply  that  the  human  consciousness  is  but  a  tem 
porary  aggregate,  —  not  an  eternal  entity.  There  is 
no  permanent  self:  there  is  but  one  eternal  princi 
ple  in  all  life,  —  the  supreme  Buddha.  Modern 
Japanese  call  this  Absolute  the  cc  Essence  of  Mind." 
"  The  fire  fed  by  faggots,"  writes  one  of  these,  cc  dies 
when  the  faggots  have  been  consumed;  but  the 
essence  of  fire  is  never  destroyed.  .  .  .  All  things 
in  the  Universe  are  Mind."  So  stated,  the  position 
is  unscientific ;  but  as  for  the  conclusion  reached,  we 
may  remember  that  Mr.  Wallace  has  stated  almost 
exactly  the  same  thing,  and  that  there  are  not  a  few 
modern  preachers  of  the  doctrine  of  a  cc  universe  of 
mind-stuff."  The  hypothesis  is  "unthinkable.''  But 
the  most  serious  thinker  will  agree  with  the  Buddhist 
assertion  that  the  relation  of  all  phenomena  to  the 
unknowable  is  merely  that  of  waves  to  sea.  C1  Every 

1  Condensed  and  somewhat  modified  in  the  definitive  edition  of  1900  ;  but,  for 
present  purposes  of  illustration,  the  text  of  the  fourth  edition  has  been  preferred. 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  241 

feeling  and  thought  being  but  transitory,"  says  Mr. 
Spencer,  "  an  entire  life  made  up  of  such  feelings 
and  thoughts  being  but  transitory,  —  nay,  the  objects 
amid  which  life  is  passed,  though  less  transitory, 
being  severally  in  course  of  losing  their  individuali 
ties  quickly  or  slowly,  —  we  learn  that  the  one  thing 
permanent  is  the  Unknown  Reality  hidden  under 
all  these  changing  shapes."  Here  the  English  and 
the  Buddhist  philosophers  are  in  accord ;  but  there 
after  they  suddenly  part  company.  For  Buddhism 
is  not  agnosticism,  but  gnosticism,  and  professes 
to  know  the  unknowable.  The  thinker  of  Mr. 
Spencer's  school  cannot  make  assumptions  as  to  the 
nature  of  the  sole  Reality,  nor  as  to  the  reason  of 
its  manifestations.  He  must  confess  himself  in 
tellectually  incapable  of  comprehending  the  nature 
of  force,  matter,  or  motion.  He  feels  justified  in 
accepting  the  hypothesis  that  all  known  elements 
have  been  evolved  from  one  primordial  undif- 
ferentiated  substance,  —  the  chemical  evidence  for 
this  hypothesis  being  very  strong.  But  he  certainly 
would  not  call  that  primordial  substance  a  substance 
of  mind,  nor  attempt  to  explain  the  character  of  the 
forces  that  effected  its  integration.  Again,  though 
Mr.  Spencer  would  probably  acknowledge  that  we 
know  of  matter  only  as  an  aggregate  of  forces,  and 
of  atoms  only  as  force-centres,  or  knots  of  force,  he 
would  not  declare  that  an  atom  is  a  force-centre, 
and  nothing  else.  .  .  .  But  we  find  evolutionists 


242  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

of  the  German  school  taking  a  position  very  similar 
to  the  Buddhist  position,  —  which  implies  a  uni 
versal  sentiency,  or,  moie  strictly  speaking,  a  uni 
versal  potential-sentiency.  Haeckel  and  other 
German  monists  assume  such  a  condition  for  all 
substance.  They  are  not  agnostics,  therefore,  but 
gnostics ;  and  their  gnosticism  very  much  resembles 
that  of  the  higher  Buddhism. 

According  to  Buddhism  there  is  no  reality  save 
Buddha:  all  things  else  are  but  Karma.  There  is 
but  one  Life,  one  Self:  human  individuality  and 
personality  are  but  phenomenal  conditions  of  that 
Self.  Matter  is  Karma;  Mind  is  Karma  —  that 
is  to  say,  mind  as  we  know  it :  Karma,  as  visibility, 
represents  to  us  mass  and  quality ;  Karma,  as  men 
tality,  signifies  character  and  tendency.  The  pri 
mordial  substance  —  corresponding  to  the  "  protyle  " 
of  our  Monists  —  is  composed  of  Five  Elements, 
which  are  mystically  identified  with  Five  Buddhas, 
all  of  whom  are  really  but  different  modes  of  the 
One.  With  this  idea  of  a  primordial  substance 
there  is  necessarily  associated  the  idea  of  a  universal 
sentiency.  Matter  is  alive. 

Now  to  the  German  monists  also 'matter  is  alive. 
On  the  phenomena  of  cell-physiology,  Haeckel 
claims  to  base  his  conviction  that  "  even  the 
atom  is  not  without  rudimentary  form  of  sensation 
and  will,  —  or,  as  it  is  better  expressed,  of  feeling 
(aesthesis),  and  of  inclination  (tropesis),  —  that  is  to 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  243 

say,  a  universal  soul  of  the  simplest  kind."  I 
may  quote  also  from  Haeckel's  Riddle  of  the 
Universe  the  following  paragraph  expressing  the 
monistic  notion  of  substance  as  held  by  Vogt  and 
others : — 

"The  two  fundamental  forms  of  substance,  ponderable 
matter  and  ether,  are  not  dead  and  only  moved  by  extrinsic 
force  ;  but  they  are  endowed  with  sensation  and  will  (though, 
naturally,  of  the  lowest  grade)  ;  they  experience  an  in 
clination  for  condensation,  a  dislike  of  strain ;  they  strive 
after  the  one,  and  struggle  against  the  other." 

Less  like  a  revival  of  the  dreams  of  the  Alche 
mists  is  the  very  probable  hypothesis  of  Schneider, 
that  sentiency  begins  with  the  formation  of  certain 
combinations,  —  that  feeling  is  evolved  from  the 
non-feeling  just  as  organic  being  has  been  evolved 
from  inorganic  substance.  But  all  these  monist 
ideas  enter  into  surprising  combination  with  the 
Buddhist  teaching  about  matter  as  integrated  Karma; 
and  for  that  reason  they  are  well  worth  citing  in  this 
relation.  To  Buddhist  conception  all  matter  is  sen 
tient, — the  sentiency  varying  according  to  condition  : 
"  even  rocks  and  stones,"  a  Japanese  Buddhist 
text  declares,  "  can  worship  Buddha/'  In  the  Ger 
man  monism  of  Professor  Haeckel's  school,  the 
particular  qualities  and  affinities  of  the  atom  repre 
sent  feeling  and  inclination,  "  a  soul  of  the  simplest 
kind " ;  in  Buddhism  these  qualities  are  made  by 


244  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

Karma,  —  that  is  to  say,  they  represent  tendencies 
formed  in  previous  states  of  existence.  The  hy 
potheses  appear  to  be  very  similar.  But  there  is  one 
immense,  all-important  difference,  between  the  Occi 
dental  and  the  Oriental  monism.  The  former  would 
attribute  the  qualities  of  the  atom  merely  to  a  sort 
of  heredity,  —  to  the  persistency  of  tendencies  devel 
oped  under  chance-influences  operating  throughout 
an  incalculable  past.  The  latter  declares  the  history 
of  the  atom  to  be  purely  moral !  All  matter,  accord 
ing  to  Buddhism,  represents  aggregated  sentiency, 
making,  by  its  inherent  tendencies,  toward  conditions 
of  pain  or  pleasure,  evil  or  good.  "  Pure  actions/' 
writes  the  author  of  Outlines  of  the  Mahayana 
Philosophy,  "  bring  forth  the  Pure  Lands  of  all 
the  quarters  of  the  universe;  while  impure  deeds 
produce  the  Impure  Lands."  That  is  to  say,  the 
matter  integrated  by  the  force  of  moral  acts  goes  to 
the  making  of  blissful  worlds;  and  the  matter  formed 
by  the  force  of  immoral  acts  goes  to  the  making  of 
miserable  worlds.  All  substance,  like  all  mind,  has 
its  Karma;  planets,  like  men,  are  shaped  by  the 
creative  power  of  acts  and  thoughts ;  and  every 
atom  goes  to  its  appointed  place,  sooner  or  later, 
according  to  the  moral  or  immoral  quality  of  the 
tendencies  that  inform  it.  Your  good  or  bad  thought 
or  deed  will  not  only  affect  your  next  rebirth,  but 
will  likewise  affect  in  some  sort  the  nature  of  worlds 
yet  unevolved,  wherein,  after  innumerable  cycles, 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  245 

you  may  have  to  live  again.  Of  course,  this  tre 
mendous  idea  has  no  counterpart  in  modern  evolu 
tional  philosophy.  Mr.  Spencer's  position  is  well 
known ;  but  I  must  quote  him  for  the  purpose  of 
emphasizing  the  contrast  between  Buddhist  and 
scientific  thought :  — 

"...  We  have  no  ethics  of  nebular  condensation,  or  of 
sidereal  movement,  or  of  planetary  evolution;  the  conception 
is  not  relevant  to  inorganic  matter.  Nor,  when  we  turn  to 
organized  things,  do  we  find  that  it  has  any  relation  to  the 
phenomena  of  plant-life ;  though  we  ascribe  to  plants 
superiorities  and  inferiorities,  leading  to  successes  and  fail 
ures  in  the  struggle  for  existence,  we  do  not  associate 
with  them  praise  or  blame.  It  is  only  with  the  rise  of 
sentiency  in  the  animal'  world  that  the  subject-matter  of 
ethics  originates."  —  Principles  of  Ethics^  Vol.  II,  §  326. 

On  the  contrary,  it  will  be  seen,  Buddhism 
actually  teaches  what  we  may  call,  to  borrow  Mr. 
Spencer's  phrase,  cc  the  ethics  of  nebular  condensa 
tion," —  though  to  Buddhist  astronomy,  the  scien 
tific  meaning  of  the  term  "  nebular  condensation  " 
was  never  known.  Of  course  the  hypothesis  is  be 
yond  the  power  of  human  intelligence  to  prove  or 
to  disprove.  But  it  is  interesting,  for  it  proclaims 
a  purely  moral  order  of  the  cosmos,  and  attaches 
almost  infinite  consequence  to  the  least  of  human 
acts.  Had  the  old  Buddhist  metaphysicians  been 
acquainted  with  the  facts  of  modern  chemistry,  they 


246  THE   HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

might  have  applied  their  doctrine,  with  appalling 
success,  to  the  interpretation  of  those  facts.  They 
might  have  explained  the  dance  of  atoms,  the  affini 
ties  of  molecules,  the  vibrations  of  ether,  in  the 
most  fascinating  and  terrifying  way  by  their  theory 
of  Karma.  .  .  .  Here  is  a  universe  of  suggestion, 
—  most  weird  suggestion  —  for  anybody  able  and 
willing  to  dare  the  experiment  of  making  a  new 
religion,  or  at  least  a  new  and  tremendous  system  of 
Alchemy,  based  upon  the  notion  of  a  moral  order 
in  the  inorganic  world ! 

But  the  metaphysics  of  Karma  in  the  higher 
Buddhism  include  much  that  is  harder  to  under 
stand  than  any  alchemical  hypothesis  of  atom-com 
binations.  As  taught  by  popular  Buddhism,  the 
doctrine  of  rebirth  is  simple  enough,  —  signifying 
no  more  than  transmigration :  you  have  lived 
millions  of  times  in  the  past,  and  you  are  likely  to 
live  again  millions  of  times  in  the  future,  —  all  the 
conditions  of  each  rebirth  depending  upon  past  con 
duct.  The  common  notion  is  that  after  a  certain 
period  of  bodiless  sojourn  in  this  world,  the  spirit 
is  guided  somehow  to  the  place  of  its  next  incarna 
tion.  The  people,  of  course,  believe  in  souls.  But 
there  is  nothing  of  all  this  in  the  higher  doctrine, 
which  denies  transmigration,  denies  the  existence  of 
the  soul,  denies  personality.  There  is  no  Self  to  be 
reborn;  there  is  no  transmigration — and  yet  there 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  247 

is  rebirth  !  There  is  no  real  "  I  "  that  suffers  or  is 
glad  —  and  yet  there  is  new  suffering  to  be  borne 
or  new  happiness  to  be  gained  !  What  we  call  the 
Self,  —  the  personal  consciousness,  —  dissolves  at 
che  death  of  the  body ;  but  the  Karma,  formed 
during  life,  then  brings  about  the  integration  of  a 
new  body  and  a  new  consciousness.  You  suffer  in 
this  existence  because  of  acts  done  in  a  previous 
existence  —  yet  the  author  of  those  acts  was  not 
identical  with  your  present  self!  Are  you,  th^n, 
responsible  for  the  faults  of  another  person  ? 

The  Buddhist  metaphysician  would  answer  thus  : 
"The  form  of  your  question  is  wrong,  because 
it  assumes  the  existence  of  personality,  —  and  there 
is  no  personality.  There  is  really  no  such  individual 
as  the  c  you '  of  the  inquiry.  The  suffering  is 
indeed  the  result  of  errors  committed  in  some 
anterior  existence  or  existences ;  but  there  is  no 
responsibility  for  the  acts  of  another  person,  since 
there  is  no  personality.  The  c  I  '  that  was  and  the 
c  I '  that  is  represent  in  the  chain  of  transitory  being 
aggregations  momentarily  created  by  acts  and 
thoughts ;  and  the  pain  belongs  to  the  aggregates 
as  condition  resulting  from  quality."  All  this 
sounds  extremely  obscure :  to  understand  the  real 
theory  we  must  put  away  the  notion  of  personality, 
which  is  a  very  difficult  thing  to  do.  Successive 
births  do  not  mean  transmigration  in  the  common 
sense  of  that  word,  but  only  the  self-propagation  of 


248  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

Karma :  the  perpetual  multiplying  of  certain  condi 
tions  by  a  kind  of  ghostly  gemmation,  —  if  I  may 
borrow  a  biological  term.  The  Buddhist  illustration, 
however,  is  that  of  flame  communicated  from  one 
lamp-wick  to  another  :  a  hundred  lamps  may  thus 
be  lighted  from  one  flame,  and  the  hundred  flames 
will  all  be  different,  though  the  origin  of  all  was  the 
same.  Within  the  hollow  flame  of  each  transitory 
life  is  enclosed  a  part  of  the  only  Reality  ;  but  this 
is  not  a  soul  that  transmigrates.  Nothing  passes 
from  birth  to  birth  but  Karma,  —  character  or 
condition. 

One  will  naturally  ask  how  can  such  a  doctrine 
exert  any  moral  influence  whatever  ?  If  the  future 
being  shaped  by  my  Karma  is  to  be  in  nowise  iden 
tical  with  my  present  self,  —  if  the  future  conscious 
ness  evolved  by  my  Karma  is  to  be  essentially 
another  consciousness,  —  how  can  I  force  myself  to 
feel  anxious  about  the  sufferings  of  that  unborn 
person  ?  "Again  your  question  is  wrong,"  a  Buddhist 
would  answer  :  "  to  understand  the  doctrine  you  must 
get  rid  of  the  notion  of  individuality,  and  think,  not 
of  persons,  but  of  successive  states  of  feeling  and 
consciousness,  each  of  which  buds  out  of  the 
other,  —  a  chain  of  existences  interdependently 
united."  ...  I  may  attempt  another  illustration. 
Every  individual,  as  we  understand  the  term,  is  con 
tinually  changing.  All  the  structures  of  the  body 
are  constantly  undergoing  waste  and  repair ;  and  the 


THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM  249 

body  that  you  have  at  this  hour  is  not,  as  to  sub 
stance,  the  same  body  that  you  had  ten  years  ago. 
Physically  you  are  not  the  same  person  :  yet  you 
suffer  the  same  pams,  and  feel  the  same  pleasures, 
and  find  your  powers  limited  by  the  same  conditions. 
Whatever  disintegrations  and  reconstructions  of 
tissue  have  taken  place  within  you,  you  have  the 
same  physical  and  mental  peculiarities  that  you  had 
ten  years  ago.  Doubtless  the  cells  of  your  brain 
have  been  decomposed  and  recomposed  :  yet  you 
experience  the  same  emotions,  recall  the  same 
memories,  and  think  the  same  thoughts.  Every 
where  the  fresh  substance  has  assumed  the  qualities 
and  tendencies  of  the  substance  replaced.  This 
persistence  of  condition  is  like  Karma.  The  trans 
mission  of  tendency  remains,  though  the  aggregate 
is  changed.  .  .  . 

These  few  glimpses  into  the  fantastic  world  of 
Buddhist  metaphysics  will  suffice,  I  trust,  to  con 
vince  any  intelligent  reader  that  the  higher  Buddh 
ism  (to  which  belongs  the  much-discussed  and 
little-comprehended  doctrine  of  Nirvana)  could 
never  have  been  the  religion  of  millions  almost 
incapable  of  forming  abstract  ideas,  —  the  religion 
of  a  population  even  yet  in  a  comparatively  early 
stage  of  religious  evolution.  It  was  never  under 
stood  by  the  people  at  all,  nor  is  it  ever  taught  to 
them  to-day.  It  is  a  religion  of  metaphysicians,  a 


25o  THE    HIGHER   BUDDHISM 

religion  of  scholars,  a  religion  so  difficult  to  be 
understood,  even  by  persons  of  some  philosophical 
training,  that  it  might  well  be  mistaken  for  a  system 
of  universal  negation.  Yet  the  reader  should  now 
be  able  to  perceive  that,  because  a  man  disbelieves 
in  a  personal  God,  in  an  immortal  soul,  and  in  any 
continuation  of  personality  after  death,  it  does  not 
follow  that  we  are  justified  in  declaring  him  an 
irreligious  person,  —  especially  if  he  happen  to  be 
an  Oriental.  The  Japanese  scholar  who  believes  in 
the  moral  order  of  the  universe,  the  ethical  responsi 
bility  of  the  present  to  all  the  future,  the  immeasur 
able  consequence  of  every  thought  and  deed,  the 
ultimate  disparition  of  evil,  and  the  power  of  attain 
ment  to  conditions  of  infinite  memory  and  infinite 
vision,  —  cannot  be  termed  either  an  atheist  or  a 
materialist,  except  by  bigotry  and  ignorance.  Pro 
found  as  may  be  the  difference  between  his  religion 
and  our  own,  in  respect  of  symbols  and  modes  of 
thought,  the  moral  conclusions  reached  in  either 
case  are  very  much  the  same. 


The   Social   Organization 


\ 


3 


The  Social   Organization 

THE  late  Professor  Fiske,  in  his  Outline* 
of  Cosmic  Philosophy,  made  a  very  inter 
esting  remark  about  societies  like  those  of 
China,  ancient  Egypt,  and  ancient  Assyria.  "  I  am 
£xpressing,"  he  said,  "  something  more  than  an 
analogy,  I  am  describing  a  real  homology  so  far  as 
concerns  the  process  of  development,  —  when  I  say 
that  these  communities  simulated  modern  European 
nations,  much  in  the  same  way  that  a  tree-fern  of 
the  carboniferous  period  simulated  the  exogenous 
trees  of  the  present  time."  So  far  as  this  is  true  of 
China,  it  is  likewise  true  of  Japan.  The  constitu 
tion  of  the  old  Japanese  society  was  no  more  thaiT 
an  amplification  of  the  constitution  of  the  family, 
—  the  patriarchal  family  of  primitive  times.  All 
modern  V^esl?grTr societies  have  been  developed  out 
of  a  like  patriarchal  condition :  the  early  civiliza 
tions  of  Greece  and  Rome  were  similarly  constructed, 
upon  a  lesser  scale.  But  the  patriarchal  family  in 
Europe  was  disintegrated  thousands  of  years  ago ; 
the  gens  and  the  curia  dissolved  and  disappeared ; 
the  originally  distinct  classes  became  fused  together ; 
and  a  total  reorganization  of  society  was  gradually 

253 


254          THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION 

effected,  everywhere  resulting  in  the  substitution  nf 
voluntary  for  compulsory  cooperation.  Industrial 
types  of  society  developed ;  and  a  state-religion 
overshadowed  the  ancient  and  exclusive  local  cults. 
But  society  in  Japan  never,  till  within  the  present 
era,  became  one  coherent  body,  never  developed 
beyond  the  clan-stage.  It  remained  a  loose  agglom 
erate  of  clan-groups,  or  tribes,  each  religiously  and 
administratively  independent  of  the  rest;  and  this 
huge  agglomerate  was  kept  together,  not  by  volun 
tary  cooperation,  but  by  strong  compulsion.  Down 
to  the  period  of  Meiji,  and  even  for  some  time  after 
ward,  it  was  liable  to  split  and  fall  asunder  at  any 
moment  that  the  central  coercive  power  showed 
signs  of  weakness.  We  may  call  it  a  feudalism ; 
but  it  resembled  European  feudalism  only  as  a  tree- 
fern  resembles  a  tree. 

Let  us  first  briefly  consider  the  nature  of  the 
ancient  Japanese  society.  Its  original  unit  was  not 
the  household,  but  the  patriarchal jfamily,  —  that  is 
to  say,  the  gens  or  clan,  a  body  of  hundreds  or 
thousands  of  persons  claiming  descent  from  a  com 
mon  ancestor,  and  so  religiously  united  by  a  com 
mon  ancestor-worship,  —  the  cult  of  the  Ujigami. 
As  I  have  said  before,  there  were  two  classes 
of  these  patriarchal  families :  the  O-uji,  or  Great 
Clans  ;  and  the  Ko-uji,  or  Little  Clans.  The  lesser 
were  branches  of  the  greater,  and  subordinate  to 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          255 

them,  —  so  that  the  group  formed  by  an  O-uji  with 
its  Ko-uji  might  be  loosely  compared  with  the 
Roman  curia  or  Greek  phratry.  Large  bodies  of 
serfs  or  slaves  appear  to  have  been  attached  to  the 
various  great  Uji ;  and  the  number  of  these,  even  at 
a  very  early  period,  seems  to  have  exceeded  that  of 
the  members  of  the  clans  proper.  The  different 
names  given  to  these  subject-classes  indicate  differ 
ent  grades  and  kinds  of  servitude.  One  name  was 
tomobe,  signifying  bound  to  a  place,  or  district; 
another  was  yakabe,  signifying  bound  to  a  family; 
a  third  was  kakibe,  signifying  bound  to  a  close,  or 
estate ;  yet  another  and  more  general  term  was 
tami,  which  anciently  signified  "  dependants,"  but  is 
now  used  in  the  meaning  of  the  English  word 
"folk."  .  .  .  There  is  little  doubt  that  the  bulk 
of  the  people  were  in  a  condition  of  servitude,  and 
that  there  were  many  forms  of  servitude.  Mr. 
Spencer  has  pointed  out  that  a  general  distinction 
between  slavery  and  serfdom,  in  the  sense  com 
monly  attached  to  each  of  those  terms,  is  by  no 
means  easy  to  establish ;  the  real  state  of  a  subject- 
class,  especially  in  early  forms  of  society,  depending 
much  more  upon  the  character  of  the  master,  and 
the  actual  conditions  of  social  development,  than 
upon  matters  of  privilege  and  legislation.  In 
speaking  of  early  Japanese  institutions,  the  distinc 
tion  is  particularly  hard  to  draw  :  we  are  still  but 
little  informed  as  to  the  condition  of  the  subject- 


256         THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

classes  in  ancient  times.  It  is  safe  to  assert,  how 
ever,  that  there  were  then  really  but  two  great 
classes,  —  a  ruling  oligarchy,  divided  into  many 
grades  ;  and  a  subject  population,  also  divided  into 
many  grades.  Slaves  were  tattooed,  either  on  the 
face  or  some  part  of  the  body,  with  a  mark  indicat 
ing  their  ownership.  Until  within  recent  years  this 
system  of  tattooing  appears  to  have  been  maintained 
in  the  province  of  Satsuma,  —  where  the  marks 
were  put  especially  upon  the  hands ;  and  in  many 
other  provinces  the  lower  classes  were  generally 
marked  by  a  tattoo  on  the  face.  Slaves  were 
bought  and  sold  like  cattle  in  early  times,  or  pre 
sented  as  tribute  by  their  owners,  —  a  practice  con 
stantly  referred  to  in  the  ancient  records.  Their 
unions  were  not  recognized :  a  fact  which  reminds 
us  of  the  distinction  among  the  Romans  between 
connubium  and  contubernium  ;  and  the  children  of  a 
slave-mother  by  a  free  father  remained  slaves.1  In 
the  seventh  century,  however,  private  slaves  were 
declared  state-property,  and  great  numbers  were 

1  In  the  year  645,  the  Emperor  Kotoku  issued  the  following  edict  on  the 
subject  :  — 

"The  law  of  men  and  women  shall  be  that  the  children  born  of  a  free  man  and 
a  free  woman  shall  belong  to  the  father  ;  if  a  free  man  takes  to  wife  a  slave-woman, 
her  children  shall  belong  to  the  mother  5  if  a  free  woman  marries  a  slave-man,  the 
children  shall  belong  to  the  father ;  if  they  are  slaves  of  two  houses,  the  children 
shall  belong  to  the  mother.  The  children  of  temple-serfs  shall  follow  the  rule  for 
freemen.  But  in  regard  to  others  who  become  slaves,  they  shall  be  treated  accord 
ing  to  the  rule  for  slaves." — Aston's  translation  of  the  Nibongi,  Vol.  II, 

p.  20X. 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          25? 

then  emancipated, — including  nearly  all  —  probably 
all  —  who  were  artizans  or  followed  useful  callings. 
Gradually  a  large  class  of  freedmen  came  into  exist 
ence  ;  but  until  modern  times  the  great  mass  of  the 
common  people  appear  to  have  remained  in  a  con 
dition  analogous  to  serfdom.  The  greater  number 
certainly  had  no  family  names,  —  which  is  considered 
evidence  of  a  former  slave-condition.  Slaves  proper 
were  registered  in  the  names  of  their  owners :  they 
do  not  seem  to  have  had  a  cult  of  their  own,  —  in 
early  times,  at  least.  But,  prior  to  Meiji,  only  the 
aristocracy,  samurai,  doctors,  and  teachers  —  with 
perhaps  a  few  other  exceptions  —  could  use  a 
family  name.  Another  queer  bit  of  evidence  on 
the  subject,  furnished  by  the  late  Dr.  Simmons, 
relates  to  the  mode  of  wearing  the  hair  among  the 
subject-classes.  Up  to  the  time  of  the  Ashikaga 
shogunate  (1334  A.D.),  all  classes  excepting  the 
nobility,  samurai,  Shinto  priests,  and  doctors,  shaved 
the  greater  part  of  the  head,  and  wore  queues ;  and 
this  fashion  of  wearing  the  hair  was  called  yakko- 
atama  or  dorei-atama  — •  terms  signifying  "  slave- 
head,"  and  indicating  that  the  fashion  originated  in 
a  period  of  servitude. 

About  the  origin  of  Japanese  slavery,  much 
remains  to  be  learned.  There  are  evidences  of  suc 
cessive  immigrations ;  and  it  is  possible  that  some, 
at  least,  of  the  earlier  Japanese  settlers  were  reduced 
by  later  invaders  to  the  status  of  servitude.  Again, 


258          THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION 

there  was  a  considerable  immigration  of  Koreans 
and  Chinese,  some  of  whom  might  have  voluntarily 
sought  servitude  as  a  refuge  from  worse  evils.  But 
the  subject  remains  obscure.  We  know,  however, 
that  degradation  to  slavery  was  a  common  punish 
ment  in  early  times ;  also,  that  debtors  unable  to 
pay  became  the  slaves  of  their  creditors ;  also,  that 
thieves  were  sentenced  to  become  the  slaves  of  those 
whom  they  had  robbed.1  Evidently  there  were 
great  differences  in  the  conditions  of  servitude. 
The  more  unfortunate  class  of  slaves  were  scarcely 
better  off  than  domestic  animals ;  but  there  were 
serfs  who  could  not  be  bought  or  sold,  nor  em 
ployed  at  other  than  special  work ;  these  were  of 
kin  to  their  lords,  and  may  have  entered  voluntarily 
into  servitude  for  the  sake  of  sustenance  and  pro 
tection.  Their  relation  to  their  masters  reminds 
us  of  that  of  the  Roman  client  to  the  Roman 
patron. 

As  yet  it  is  difficult  to  establish  any  clear  distinc 
tion  between  the  freedmen  and  the  freemen  of 
ancient  Japanese  society ;  but  we  know  that  the 
free  population,  ranking  below  the  ruling  class, 

1  An  edict  issued  by  the  Empress  Jito,  in  690,  enacted  that  a  father  could  sell 
his  son  into  real  slavery  5  but  that  debtors  could  be  sold  only  into  a  kind  of  serfdom. 
The  edict  ran  thus  :  "  If  a  younger  brother  of  the  common  people  is  sold  by  his 
elder  brother,  he  should  be  classed  with  freemen  ;  if  a  child  is  sold  by  his  parents, 
he  should  be  classed  with  slaves  5  persons  confiscated  into  slavery,  by  way  of  pay 
ment  of  interest  on  debts,  are  to  be  classed  with  freemen  ;  and  their  children,  though 
born  of  a  union  with  a  slave,  are  to  be  all  classed  with  freemen."  —  Aston's 
Nibongi,  Vol.  II,  p.  402. 


THE    SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION          259 

consisted  of  two  great  divisions :  the  kunitsuko  and 
the  tomonotsuko.  The  first  were  farmers,  descend 
ants  perhaps  of  the  earliest  Mongol  invaders,  and 
were  permitted  to  hold  their  own  lands  indepen 
dently  of  the  central  government :  they  were  lords 
of  their  own  soil,  but  not  nobles.  The  tomonotsuko 
were  artizans,  —  probably  of  Korean  or  Chinese 
descent,  for  the  most  part,  —  and  numbered  no 
less  than  180  clans.  They  followed  hereditary 
occupations ;  and  their  clans  were  attached  to  the 
imperial  clans,  for  which  they  were  required  to 
furnish  skilled  labour. 

Originally  each  of  the  O-uji  and  Ko-uji  had  its 
own  territory,  chiefs,  dependants,  serfs,  and  slaves. 
The  chieftainships  were  hereditary,  —  descending 
from  father  to  son  in  direct  succession  from  the 
original  patriarch.  The  chief  of  a  great  clan  was 
lord  over  the  chiefs  of  the  subclans  attached  to  it : 
his  authority  was  both  religious  and  military.  It 
must  not  be  forgotten  that  religion  andjypvernment 
were  considered  identical. 

All  Japanese  cTarPfamilies  were  classed  under 
three  heads,  —  Kobfosu,  Shinb'etsu,  and  Eambetsu. 
The  Kobetsu  ("  Imperial  Branch  ")  represented  the 
so-called  imperial  families,  claiming  descent  from 
the  Sun-goddess;  the  Shinb'etsu  ("Divine  Branch") 
were  clans  claiming  descent  from  other  deities, 
terrestrial  or  celestial ;  the  Bamb'etsu  (cc  Foreign 
Branch ")  represented  the  mass  of  the  people, 


260         THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

Thus  it  would  seem  that,  by  the  ruling  classes,  the 
common  people  were  originally  considered  strangers, 

J  Japanese  only  by  adoption.    Some  scholars  think 
it  the  term  Bambetsu  was  at  first  given  to  serfs  or 
edmen  of  Chinese  or  Korean  descent.     But  this 
s  not    been  proved.      It  is  only  certain  that    all 
:iety  was  divided  into  three  classes,  according  to 
ancestry ;  that    two  of  these    classes    constituted   a 
ruling  oligarchy;1  and  that  the  third,  or  "foreign" 
class  represented  the  bulk  of  the  nation,  —  the  plebs. 
There  was  a  division    also    into   castes  —  kaban'e 
or  sei.     (I  use    the  term    "  castes,"    following    Dr. 
Florenz,  a  leading  authority  on    ancient    Japanese 
civilization,  who  gives  the  meaning  of  sei  as  equiva 
lent  to  that  of  the  Sanscrit  varna,  signifying  "  caste  " 
or    "  colour.")      Every    family    in    the    three    great 
divisions    of    Japanese    society    belonged    to    some 
caste;    and    each    caste    represented    at    first    some 
occupation    or  calling.      Caste  would    not    seem  to 
have  developed  any  very  rigid  structure  in  Japan ; 
and  there  were  early  tendencies  to  a  confusion  of 
the  kabane.     In  the  seventh  century  the  confusion 
became  so  great  that  the  Emperor  Temmu  thought 
it  necessary  to  reorganize  the  sei ;  and  by  him  all  the 
clan-families  were  regrouped  into  eight  new  castes0 

1  Dr.  Florenz  accounts  for  the  distinction  between  Kobetsu  and  Sbinbetsu  as 
due  to  the  existence  of  two  military  ruling  classes,  —  resulting  from  two  successive 
waves  of  invasion  or  immigration.  The  Kobetsu  were  the  followers  of  Jimmu 
Tenno  ;  the  Sbinbetsu  were  earlier  conquerors  who  had  settled  in  Yamato  prior  to 
the  advent  of  Jimmu.  These  first  conquerors,  he  thinks,  were  not  dispossessed. 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          261 

Such  was  the  primal  constitution  of  Japanese 
society ;  and  that  society  was,  therefore,  in  no  true 
sense  of  the  term,  a  fully  formed  nation.  Nor  can 
the  title  of  Emperor  be  correctly  applied  to  its  early 
rulers.  The  German  scholar,  Dr.  Florenz,  was  the 
first  to  establish  these  facts,  contrary  to  the  assump 
tion  of  Japanese  historians.  He  has  shown  that  the 
"  heavenly  sovereign "  of  the  early  ages  was  the 
hereditary  chief  of  one  Uji  only, — which  Uji,  being 
the  most  powerful  of  all,  exercised  influence  over 
many  of  the  others.  The  authority  of  the  "  heavenly 
sovereign  "  did  not  extend  over  the  country.  But 
though  not  even  a  king,  —  outside  of  his  own  large 
group  of  patriarchal  families,  —  he  enjoyed  three 
immense  prerogatives.  The  first  was  the  right  of 
representing  the  different  Uji  before  the  common 
ancestral  deity,  —  which  implies  the  privileges  and 
powers  of  a  high  priest.  The  second  was  the  right 
of  representing  the  different  Uji  in  foreign  relations: 
that  is  to  say,  he  could  make  peace  or  declare  war  in 
the  name  of  all  the  clans,  and  therefore  exercised  the 
supreme  military  authority.  His  third  prerogative 
included  the  right  to  settle  disputes  between  clans ; 
the  right  to  nominate  a  clan-patriarch,  in  case  that 
the  line  of  direct  succession  to  the  chieftainship  of 
any  Uji  came  to  an  end  ;  the  right  to  establish  new 
Uji ;  and  the  right  to  abolish  an  Uji  guilty  of  so  act 
ing  as  to  endanger  the  welfare  of  the  rest.  He  was, 
therefore,  Supreme  PontirT,  Supreme  Military  Com- 


262          THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

mander,  Supreme  Arbitrator,  and  Supreme  Magis 
trate.  But  he  was  not  yet  supreme  king :  his 
powers  were  exercised  only  by  consent  of  the  clans. 
Later  he  was  to  become  the  Great  Khan  in  very 
fact,  and  even  much  more,  —  the  Priest-Ruler,  the 
God- King,  the  Deity-Incarnate.  But  with  the  growth 
of  his  dominion,  it  became  more  and  more  difficult 
for  him  to  exercise  all  the  functions  originally  com 
bined  in  his  authority ;  and,  as  a  consequence  of 
deputing  those  functions,  his  temporal  sway  was 
doomed  to  decline,  even  while  his  religious  power 
continued  to  augment. 

The  earliest  Japanese  society  was  not,  therefore, 
even  a  feudalism  in  the  meaning  which  we  com 
monly  attach  to  that  word :  it  was  a  union  of  clans 
at  first  combined  for  defence  and  offence,  —  each 
clan  having  a  religion  of  its  own.  Gradually  one 
clan-group,  by  power  of  wealth  and  numbers, 
obtained  such  domination  that  it  was  able  to  impose 
its  cult  upon  all  the  rest,  and  to  make  its  hereditary 
chief  Supreme  High  Pontiff.  The  worship  of  the 
Sun-goddess  so  became  a  race-cult ;  but  this  worship 
did  not  diminish  the  relative  importance  of  the  other 
clan-cults,  —  it  only  furnished  them  with  a  common 
tradition.  Eventually  a  nation  formed ;  but  the 
clan  remained  the  real  unit  of  society ;  and  not 
until  the  present  era  of  Meiji  was  its  disintegration 
effected  —  at  least  in  so  far  as  legislation  could 
accomplish. 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          263 

We  may  call  that  period  during  which  the  clans 
became  really  united  under  one  head,  and  the 
national  cult  was  established,  the  First  Period  of 
Japanese  Social  Evolution.  However,  the  social 
organism  did  not  develop  to  the  limit  of  its  type  until 
the  era  of  the  Tokugawa  shoguns, —  so  that,  in 
order  to  study  it  as  a  completed  structure,  we  must 
turn  to  modern  times.  Yet  it  had  taken  on  the 
vague  outline  of  its  destined  form  as  early  as  the 
reign  of  the  Emperor  Temmu,  whose  accession 
is  generally  dated  673  A.D.  During  that  reign 
Buddhism  appears  to  have  become  a  powerful  influ 
ence  at  court ;  for  the  Emperor  practically  imposec 
a  vegetarian  diet  upon  the  people  —  proof  positiv< 
of  supreme  power  in  fart  as  well  as  in  theory.  Evei 
before  this  time  society  had  been  arranged  int< 
ranks  and  grades,  —  each  of  the  upper  grades  bein| 
distinguished  by  the  form  and  quality  of  the  official1 
head-dresses  worn  ;  but  the  Emperor  Temmu  estab 
lished  many  new  grades,  and  reorganized  the  whole 
administration,  after  the  Chinese  manner,  in  one 
hundred  and  eight  departments.  Japanese  society 
then  assumed,  as  to  its  upper  ranks,  nearly  all  the 
hierarchical  forms  which  it  presented  down  to  the  era 
of  the  Tokugawa  shoguns,  who  consolidated  the 
system  without  seriously  changing  its  fundamental 
structure.  We  may  say  that  from  the  close  of  the 
First  Period  of  its  social  evolution,  the  nation  re 
mained  practically  separated  into  two  classes :  the 


264         THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

governing  class,  including  all  orders  of  the  nobility 
and  military ;  and  the  producing  class,  comprising 
all  the  rest.  The  chief  event  of  the  Second  Period 
of  the  social  evolution  was  the  rise  of  the  military 
power,  which  left  the  imperial  religious  authority  in 
tact,  but  usurped  all  the  administrative  functions  — 
(this  subject  will  be  considered  in  a  later  chapter). 
The  society  eventually  crystallized  by  this  military 
power  was  a  very  complex  structure  —  outwardly 
resembling  a  huge  feudalism,  as  we  understand  the 
term,  but  intrinsically  different  from  any  European 
feudalism  that  ever  existed.  The  difference  lay 
especially  in  the  religious  organization  of  the  Japan 
ese  communities,  each  of  which,  retaining  its  par 
ticular  cult  and  patriarchal  administration,  remained 
essentially  separate  from  every  other.  The  national 
cult  was  a  bond  of  tradition,  not  of  cohesion  :  there 
was  no  religious  unity.  Buddhism,  though  widely 
accepted,  brought  no  real  change  into  this  order  of 
things  ;  for,  whatever  Buddhist  creed  a  commune 
might  profess,  the  real  social  bond  remained  the 
ond  of  the  Ujigami.  So  that,  even  as  fully  devel- 
ped  under  the  Tokugawa  rule,  Japanese  society 
was  still  but  a  great  aggregate  of  clans  and  subclans, 
kept  together  by  military  coercion. 

At  the  head  of  this  vast  aggregate  was  the 
Heavenly  Sovereign,  the  Living  God  of  the  race, 
—  Priest-Emperor  and  Pontiff  Supreme,  —  repre 
senting  the  oldest  dynasty  in  the  world. 


THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION          265 

Next  to  him  stood  the  Kuge,  or  ancient  nobility, 

—  descendants   of  emperors  and  of  gods.       There 
were,  in  the  time  of  the  Tokugawa,  155  families  of 
this  high   nobility.     One   of  these,  the  Nakatomi, 
held,  and  still  holds,  the  highest  hereditary  priest 
hood  :  the  Nakatomi  were,  under  the  Emperor,  the 
chiefs  of  the  ancestral  cult.      All  the  great  clans  of 
early  Japanese  history  —  such  as  the  Fujiwara,  the 
Taira,  the  Minamoto — were  Kuge;  and  most  of 
the  great  regents  and  shoguns  of  later  history  were 
either  Kuge  or  descendants  of  Kuge. 

Next  to  the  Kuge  ranked  the  Buke,  or  military 
class,  —  also  called  Monofufu,  Wasaraii,  or  Samu- 
rahi  (according  to  the  ancient  writing  of  these  names), 

—  with  an  extensive  hierarchy  of  its  own.      But  the 
difference,  in  most  cases,  between  the  lords  and  the 
warriors  of  the  Buke  was  a  difference  of  rank  based 
upon  income  and  title  :  all  alike  were  samurai,  and 
nearly  all  were   of  Kobetsu   or   Shinbetsu   descent. 
In  early  times  the  head  of  the   military  class  was 
appointed    by   the   Emperor,  only   as  a  temporary 
commander-in-chief :  afterwards,  these  commanders- 
in-chief,  by  usurpation  of  power,  made  their  office 
hereditary,  and  became  veritable  tmperatores,  in  the 
Roman  sense.     Their  title  of  shdgun  is  well  known 
to  Western  readers.     The   shogun   ruled  over  be 
tween  two  and  three  hundred  lords  of  provinces  or 
districts,  whose  powers  and  privileges  varied  accord 
ing   to  income  and  grade      Under  the  Tokugawa 


266          THE    SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION 

shogimate  there  were  292  of  these  lords,  or  daimyo. 
Before  that  time  each  lord  exercised  supreme  rule 
over  his  own  domain  ;  and  it  is  not  surprising  that 
the  Jesuit  missionaries,  as  well  as  the  early  Dutch 
and  English  traders  should  have  called  the  daimyo 
"  kings."  The  despotism  of  the  daimyo  was  first 
checked  by  the  founders  of  the  Tokugawa  dynasty, 
lyeyasu,  who  so  restricted  their  powers  that  they 
became,  with  some  exceptions,  liable  to  lose  their 
estates  if  proved  guilty  of  oppression  and  cruelty. 
He  ranked  them  all  in  four  great  classes  :  (i)  Sanke, 
or  Go-Sanke,  the  "Three  Exalted  Families"  (those 
from  whom  a  successor  to  the  shogunate  might 
be  chosen  in  case  of  need)  ;  (2)  Kokushu,  "  Lords 
of  Provinces  "  ;  (3)  Tozama,  "  Outside-Lords  "  • 
(4)  Fudai)  "  Successful  Families "  :  a  name  given 
to  those  families  promoted  to  lordship  or  otherwise 
rewarded  for  fealty  to  lyeyasu.  Of  the  Sanke,  there 
were  three  clans,  or  families  :  of  the  Kokushu,  eigh 
teen  ;  of  the  Tozama,  eighty-six  ;  and  of  the  Fudai, 
one  hundred  and  seventy-six.  The  income  of  the 
least  of  these  daimyo  was  10,000  koku  of  rice  (we 
may  say  about  ^£  10,000,  though  the  value  of  the 
koku  differed  greatly  at  different  periods) ;  and  the 
income  of  the  greatest,  the  Lord  of  Kaga,  was  esti 
mated  at  1,027,000  koku. 

The  great  daimyo  had  their  greater  and  lesser 
vassals ;  and  each  of  these,  again,  had  his  force  of 
trained  samurai,  or  fighting  gentry.  There  was 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          267 

also  a  particular  class  of  soldier-farmers,  called  gdshi, 
some  of  whom  possessed  privileges  and  powers  ex 
ceeding  those  of  the  lesser  daimyo.  These  gdshi,  who 
were  independent  landowners,  for  the  most  part, 
formed  a  kind  of  yeomanry ;  but  there  were  many 
points  of  difference  between  the  social  position  of 
the  goshi  and  that  of  the  English  yeomen. 

Besides  reorganizing  the  military  class,  lyeyasu 
created  several  new  subclasses.  The  more  important 
of  these  were  the  hatamoto  and  the  gokenin.  The 
hatamoto,  whose  appellation  signifies  "  banner-sup 
porters,"  numbered  about  2000,  and  the  gokenin 
about  5000.  These  two  bodies  of  samurai  formed 
the  special  military  force  of  the  shogun  ;  the 
hatamoto  being  greater  vassals,  with  large  incomes ; 
and  the  gokenin  lesser  vassals,  with  small  incomes, 
who  ranked  above  other  common  samurai  only  be 
cause  of  being  directly  attached  to  the  shogun's 
service.  .  .  .  The  total  number  of  samurai  of  all 
grades  was  about  2,000,000.  They  were  exempted 
from  taxation,  and  privileged  to  wear  two  swords. 

Such,  in  brief  outline,  was  the  general  ordination 
of  those  noble  and  military  classes  by  whom  the 
nation  was  ruled  with  great  severity.  The  bulk  of 
the  common  people  were  divided  into  three  classes 
(we  might  even  say  castes,  but  for  Indian  ideas 
long  associated  with  the  term) :  Farmers,  Artizans, 
and  Merchants. 


268         THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

Of  these  three  classes,  the  farmers  (hyakushd)  were 
the  highest ;  ranking  immediately  after  the  samurai. 
Indeed,  it  is  hard  to  draw  a  line  between  the  samurai- 
class  and  the  farming-class,  —  because  many  samurai 
were  farmers  also,  and  because  some  farmers  held  a 
rank  considerably  above  that  of  ordinary  samurai. 
Perhaps  we  should  limit  the  term  hyakushd  (farmers, 
or  peasantry)  to  those  tillers  of  the  soil  who  lived 
only  by  agriculture,  and  were  neither  of  Kdbetsu  nor 
Shimbetsu  descent.  ...  At  all  events,  the  occupa 
tion  of  the  peasant  was  considered  honourable  :  a 
farmer's  daughter  might  become  a  servant  in  the 
imperial  household  itself —  though  she  could  occupy 
only  an  humble  position  in  the  service.  Certain 
farmers  were  privileged  to  wear  swords.  It  appears 
that  in  the  early  ages  of  Japanese  society  there  was 
no  distinction  between  farmers  and  warriors  :  all 
able-bodied  farmers  were  then  trained  fighting-men, 
ready  for  war  at  any  moment,  —  a  condition  paral 
leled  in  old  Scandinavian  society.  After  a  special 
military  class  had  been  evolved,  the  distinction  be 
tween  farmer  and  samurai  still  remained  vague  in 
certain  parts  of  the  country.  In  Satsuma  and  in 
Tosa,  for  example,  the  samurai  continued  to  farm 
down  to  the  present  era :  the  best  of  the  Kyushu 
samurai  were  nearly  all  farmers  ;  and  their  superior 
stature  and  strength  were  commonly  attributed  to 
their  rustic  occupations.  In  other  parts  of  the  coun 
try,  as  in  Izumo,  farming  was  forbidden  to  samurai 


THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION          269 

they  were  not  even  allowed  to  hold  rice-land,  though 
they  might  own  forest-land.  But  in  various  prov 
inces  they  were  permitted  to  farm,  even  while  strictly 
forbidden  to  follow  any  other  occupation, —  any  trade 
or  craft.  ...  At  no  time  did  any  degradation  attach 
to  the  pursuit  of  agriculture.  Some  of  the  early 
emperors  took  a  personal  interest  in  farming;  and  in 
the  grounds  of  the  Imperial  Palace  at  Akasaka  may 
even  now  be  seen  a  little  rice-field.  By  religious 
tradition,  immemorially  old,  the  first  sheaf  of  rice 
grown  within  the  imperial  grounds  should  be  reaped 
and  offered  by  the  imperial  hand  to  the  divine  an 
cestors  as  a  harvest  offering,  on  the  occasion  of  the 
Ninth  Festival,  —  Shin-Sho-Sai} 

Below  the  peasantry  ranked  the  artizan-class  (Sho- 
kuniri),  including  smiths,  carpenters,  weavers,  potters, 
—  all  crafts,  in  short.  Highest  among  these  were 
reckoned,  as  we  might  expect,  the  sword-smiths. 
Sword-smiths  not  infrequently  rose  to  dignities 
far  beyond  their  class  :  some  had  conferred  upon 
them  the  high  title  of  Kami,  written  with  the  same 
character  used  in  the  title  of  a  daimyo,  who  was  usu 
ally  termed  the  Kami  of  his  province  or  district.  Nat 
urally  they  enjoyed  the  patronage  of  the  highest, — 
emperors  and  Kuge.  The  Emperor  Go-Toba  is 
known  to  have  worked  at  sword-making  in  a  smithy 

1  At  this  festival  the  first  new  silk  of  the  year,  as  well  as  the  first  of  the  ne* 
rice-crop,  is  still  offered  to  the  Sun-goddess  by  the  Emperor  in  person. 


270          THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION 

of  his  own.  Religious  rites  were  practised  during 
the  forging  of  a  blade  down  to  modern  times.  .  .  . 
All  the  principal  crafts  had  guilds ;  and,  as  a 
general  rule,  trades  were  hereditary.  There  are 
good  historical  grounds  for  supposing  that  the  an 
cestors  of  the  Sh5kunin  were  mostly  Koreans  and 
Chinese. 

The  commercial  class  (Akindo),  including  bank 
ers,  merchants,  shopkeepers,  and  traders  of  all  kinds, 
was  the  lowest  officially  recognized.  The  business 
of  money-making  was  held  in  contempt  by  the  su 
perior  classes  ;  and  all  methods  of  profiting  by  the 
purchase  and  re-sale  of  the  produce  of  labour  were 
regarded  as  dishonourable.  A  military  aristocracy 
would  naturally  look  down  upon  the  trading- 
classes  ;  and  there  is  generally,  in  militant  so 
cieties,  small  respect  for  the  common  forms  of 
labour.  But  in  Old  Japan  the  occupations  of  the 
farmer  and  the  artizan  were  not  despised :  trade 
alone  appears  to  have  been  considered  degrading,  — 
and  the  discrimination  may  have  been  partly  a 
moral  one.  The  relegation  of  the  mercantile  class 
to  the  lowest  place  in  the  social  scale  must  have 
produced  some  curious  results.  However  rich,  for 
example,  a  rice-dealer  might  be,  he  ranked  below 
the  carpenters  or  potters  or  boat-builders  whom  he 
might  employ,  —  unless  it  happened  that  his  family 
originally  belonged  to  another  class.  In  later  times 


THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION          271 

the  Alcind5  included  many  persons  of  other  than 
Akindo  descent ;  and  the  class  thus  virtually  re 
trieved  itself. 

Of  the  four  great  classes  of  the  nation  —  Samu 
rai,  Farmers,  Artizans,  and  Merchants  (the  Shi-No- 
Ko-Sho,  as  they  were  briefly  called,  after  the  initial 
characters  of  the  Chinese  terms  used  to  designate 
them)  —  the  last  three  were  counted  together  under 
the  general  appellation  of  Heimin,  cc  common  folk." 
All  heimin  were  subject  to  the  samurai ;  any  samu 
rai  being  privileged  to  kill  the  heimin  showing  him 
disrespect.  But  the  heimin  were  actually  the  nation  : 
they  alone  created  the  wealth  of  the  country,  pro 
duced  the  revenues,  paid  the  taxes,  supported  the 
nobility  and  military  and  clergy.  As  for  the  clergy, 
the  Buddhist  (like  the  Shint5)  priests,  though 
forming  a  class  apart,  ranked  with  the  samurai,  not 
with  the  heimin. 

Outside  of  the  three  classes  of  commoners,  and 
hopelessly  below  the  lowest  of  them,  large  classes  of 
persons  existed  who  were  not  reckoned  as  Japanese, 
and  scarcely  accounted  human  beings.  Officially 
they  were  mentioned  generically  as  chori,  and  were 
counted  with  the  peculiar  numerals  used  in  counting 
animals  :  ippiki,  nihiki,  sambiki,  etc.  Even  to-day 
they  are  commonly  referred  to,  not  as  persons  (hito\ 
but  as  "  things  "  (mono).  To  English  readers  (chiefly 
through  Mr.  Mitford's  yet  unrivalled  Tales  of  Old 


272         THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

Japan]  they  are  known  as  £ta ;  but  their  appella* 
tions  varied  according  to  their  callings.  They  were 
pariah-people  :  Japanese  writers  have  denied,  upon 
apparently  good  grounds,  that  the  chori  belong  to 
the  Japanese  race.  Various  tribes  of  these  outcasts 
followed  occupations  in  the  monopoly  of  which  they 
were  legally  confirmed  :  they  were  well-diggers,  gar 
den-sweepers,  straw-workers,  sandal-makers,  accord 
ing  to  local  privileges.  One  class  was  employed 
officially  in  the  capacity  of  torturers  and  execu 
tioners  ;  another  was  employed  as  night-watchmen  ; 
a  third  as  grave-makers.  But  most  of  the  Eta  fol 
lowed  the  business  of  tanners  and  leather-dressers. 
They  alone  had  the  right  to  slaughter  and  flay 
animals,  to  prepare  various  kinds  of  leather,  and  to 
manufacture  leather  sandals,  stirrup-straps,  and  drum 
heads, —  the  making  of  drumheads  being  a  lucrative 
occupation  in  a  country  where  drums  were  used  in  a 
hundred  thousand  temples.  The  Eta  had  their  own 
laws,  and  their  own  chiefs,  who  exercised  powers  of 
life  and  death.  They  lived  always  in  the  suburbs  or 
immediate  neighbourhood  of  towns,  but  only  in  sepa 
rate  settlements  of  their  own.  They  could  enter  the 
town  to  sell  their  wares,  or  to  make  purchases ;  but 
they  could  not  enter  any  shop,  except  the  shop  of 
a  dealer  in  footgear.1  As  professional  singers  they 
were  tolerated  ;  but  they  were  forbidden  to  enter  any 
house  —  so  they  could  perform  their  music  or  sing 

1  This  is  still  the  rule  in  certain  parts  of  the  countty. 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          273 

their  songs  only  in  the  street,  or  in  a  garden.  Any 
occupations  other  than  their  hereditary  callings  were 
strictly  forbidden  to  them.  Between  the  lowest  of 
the  commercial  classes  and  the  Eta,  the  barrier  was 
impassable  as  any  created  by  caste- tradition  in  India; 
and  never  was  Ghetto  more  separated  from  the  rest 
of  a  European  city  by  walls  and  gates,  than  an  Eta 
settlement  from  the  rest  of  a  Japanese  town  by  social 
prejudice.  No  Japanese  would  dream  of  entering 
an  Eta  settlement  unless  obliged  to  do  so  in  some 
official  capacity.  ...  At  the  pretty  little  seaport  of 
Mionoseki,  I  saw  an  Eta  settlement,  forming  one 
termination  of  the  crescent  of  streets  extending  round 
the  bay.  Mionoseki  is  certainly  one  of  the  most 
ancient  towns  in  Japan ;  and  the  Eta  village  attached 
to  it  must  be  very  old.  Even  to-day,  no  Japanese 
habitant  of  Mionoseki  would  think  of  walking 
through  that  settlement,  though  its  streets  are  con 
tinuations  of  the  other  streets :  children  never  pass 
the  unmarked  boundary ;  and  the  very  dogs  will  not 
cross  the  prejudice-line.  For  all  that  the  settlement 
is  clean,  well  built,  —  with  gardens,  baths,  and 
temples  of  its  own.  It  looks  like  any  well-kept 
Japanese  village.  But  for  perhaps  a  thousand  years 
there  has  been  no  fellowship  between  the  people  of 
those  contiguous  communities.  .  .  .  Nobody  can 
now  tell  the  history  of  these  outcast  folk :  the  cause 
of  their  social  excommunication  has  long  been  for 
gotten. 


274          THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION 

Besides  the  Eta  proper,  there  were  pariahs  called 
hinin,  —  a  name  signifying  "  not-human-beings/' 
Under  this  appellation  were  included  professional 
mendicants,  wandering  minstrels,  actors,  certain 
classes  of  prostitutes,  and  persons  outlawed  by 
society.  The  hinin  had  their  own  chiefs,  and  their 
own  laws.  Any  person  expelled  from  a  Japanese 
community  might  join  the  hinin  ;  but  that  signified 
good-by  to  the  rest  of  humanity.  The  Govern 
ment  was  too  shrewd  to  persecute  the  hinin.  Their 
gipsy-existence  saved  a  world  of  trouble.  It  was 
unnecessary  to  keep  petty  offenders  in  jail,  or  to 
provide  for  people  incapable  of  earning  an  honest 
living,  so  long  as  these  could  be  driven  into  the 
hinin  class.  There  the  incorrigible,  the  vagrant,  the 
beggar,  would  be  kept  under  discipline  of  a  sort,  and 
would  practically  disappear  from  official  cognizance. 
The  killing  of  a  hinin  was  not  considered  murder, 
and  was  punished  only  by  a  fine. 

The  reader  should  now  be  able  to  form  an  approxi 
mately  correct  idea  of  the  character  of  the  old  Japan 
ese  society.  But  the  ordination  of  that  society  was 
much  more  complex  than  I  have  been  able  to  indi 
cate, —  so  complex  that  volumes  would  be  required 
to  treat  the  subject  in  detail.  Once  fully  evolved, 
what  we  may  still  call  Feudal  Japan,  for  want  of 
a  better  name,  presented  most  of  the  features  of  a 
doubly-compound  society  of  the  militant  type,  with 


THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION          275 

certain  marked  approaches  toward  the  trebly-com 
pound  type.  A  striking  peculiarity,  of  course,  is 
the  absence  of  a  true  ecclesiastical  hierarchy,  —  due 
to  the  fact  that  Government  never  became  dissoci 
ated  from  religion.  There  was  at  one  time  a  ten 
dency  on  the  part  of  Buddhism  to  establish  a  religious 
hierarchy  independent  of  central  authority;  but  there 
were  two  fatal  obstacles  in  the  way  of  such  a  develop 
ment.  The  first  was  the  condition  of  Buddhism 
itself, — divided  into  a  number  of  sects,  some  bitterly 
opposed  to  others.  The  second  obstacle  was  the 
implacable  hostility  of  the  military  clans,  jealous  of 
any  religious  power  capable  of  interfering,  either 
directly  or  indirectly,  with  their  policy.  So  soon 
as  the  foreign  religion  began  to  prove  itself  formid 
able  in  the  world  of  action,  ruthless  measures  were 
decided ;  and  the  frightful  massacres  of  priests  by 
Nobunaga,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  ended  the 
political  aspirations  of  Buddhism  in  Japan. 

Otherwise  the  regimentation  of  society  resembled 
that  of  all  antique  civilizations  of  the  militant  type, 
—  all  action  being  both  positively  and  negatively 
regulated.  The  household  ruled  the  person ;  the 
five-family  group,  the  household  ;  the  community, 
the  group  ;  the  lord  of  the  soil,  the  community  ;  the 
Shogun,  the  lord.  Over  the  whole  body  of  the  pro 
ducing  classes,  two  million  samurai  had  power  of  life 
and  death  ;  over  these  samurai  the  daimyo  held  a  like 
power ;  and  the  daimyo  were  subject  to  the  Shogun. 


276          THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION 

Nominally  the  Shogun  was  subject  to  the  Emperor, 
but  not  in  fact :  military  usurpation  disturbed  and 
shifted  the  natural  order  of  the  higher  responsibility 
However,  from  the  nobility  downwards,  the  regula 
tive  discipline  was  much  reinforced  by  this  change 
in  government.  Among  the  producing  classes  there 
were  countless  combinations  —  guilds  of  all  sorts ; 
but  these  were  only  despotisms  within  despotisms 
—  despotisms  of  the  communistic  order;  each  mem 
ber  being  governed  by  the  will  of  the  rest ;  and 
enterprise,  whether  commercial  or  industrial,  being 
impossible  outside  of  some  corporation.  .  .  .  We 
have  already  seen  that  the  individual  was  bound  to 
the  commune  —  could  not  leave  it  without  a  permit, 
could  not  marry  out  of  it.  We  have  seen  also  that 
the  stranger  was  a  stranger  in  the  old  Greek  and 
Roman  sense,  —  that  is  to  say  an  enemy,  a  hostis,  — 
^  and  could  enter  another  community  only  by  being 
religiously  adopted  into  it.  As  regards  exclusive- 
ness,  therefore,  the  social  conditions  were  like  those 
of  the  early  European  communities ;  but  the  mili 
tant  conditions  resembled  rather  those  of  the  great 
Asiatic  empires. 

Of  course  such  a  society  had  nothing  in  common 
with  any  modern  form  of  Occidental  civilization.  It 
was  a  huge  mass  of  clan-groups,  loosely  united  under 
a  duarchy,  in  which  the  military  head  was  omnipo 
tent,  and  the  religious  head  only  an  object  of 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          277 

worship,  —  the  living  symbol  of  a  cult.  However 
this  organization  might  outwardly  resemble  what  we 
are  accustomed  to  call  feudalism,  its  structure  was 
rather  like  that  of  ancient  Egyptian  or  Peruvian 
society,  —  minus  the  priestly  hierarchy.  The  su 
preme  figure  is  not  an  Emperor  in  our  meaning  of 
the  word,  —  not  a  king  of  kings  and  vicegerent  of 
heaven,  —  but  a  God  incarnate,  a  race-divinity,  an 
Inca  descended  from  the  Sun.  About  his  sacred 
person,  we  see  the  tribes  ranged  in  obeisance, — 
each  tribe,  nevertheless,  maintaining  its  own  ances 
tral  cult ;  and  the  clans  forming  these  tribes,  and 
the  communities  forming  these  clans,  and  the  house 
holds  forming  these  communities,  have  all  their  sepa 
rate  cults ;  and  out  of  the  mass  of  these  cults  have 
been  derived  the  customs  and  the  laws.  Yet  every 
where  the  customs  and  the  laws  differ  more  or  less, 
because  of  the  variety  of  their  origins  :  they  have 
this  only  in  common,  —  that  they  exact  the  most 
humble  and  implicit  obedience,  and  regulate  every 
detail  of  private  and  public  life.  Personality  is 
wholly  suppressed  by  coercion  ;  and  ~tKe"  coercion 
is  chiefly  from  within,  not  from  without,  —  the  life 
of  every  individual  being  so  ordered  by  the  will  of 
the  rest  as  to  render  free  action,  free  speaking,  or 
free  thinking,  out  of  the  question.  This  means 
something  incomparably  harsher  than  the  socialistic 
tyranny  of  early  Greek  society :  it  means  religious 
communism  doubled  with  a  military  despotism  of 


278         THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

the  most  terrible  kind.  The  individual  did  not 
legally  exist,  —  except  for  punishment ;  and  from 
the  whole  of  the  producing-classes,  whether  serfs 
or  freemen,  the  most  servile  submission  was  ruth 
lessly  exacted. 

It  is  difficult  to  believe  that  any  intelligent  man 
of  modern  times  could  endure  such  conditions  and 
live  (except  under  the  protection  of  some  power 
ful  ruler,  as  in  the  case  of  the  English  pilot  Will 
Adams,  created  a  samurai  by  lyeyasu) :  the  in 
cessant  and  multiform  constraint  upon  mental  and 
moral  life  would  of  itself  be  enough  to  kill.  .  .  . 
Those  who  write  to-day  about  the  extraordinary 
capacity  of  the  Japanese  for  organization,  and  about 
the  "  democratic  spirit "  of  the  people  as  natural 
proof  of  their  fitness  for  representative  government 
in  the  Western  sense,  mistake  appearances  for  reali 
ties.  The  truth  is  that  the  extraordinary  capacity 
of  the  Japanese  for  communal  organization,  is  the 
strongest  possible  evidence  of  their  unfitness  for  any 
modern  democratic  form  of  government.  Superficially 
the  difference  between  Japanese  social  organization, 
and  local  self-government  in  the  modern  American, 
or  the  English  colonial  meaning  of  the  term,  appears 
slight ;  and  we  may  justly  admire  the  perfect  self- 
discipline  of  a  Japanese  community.  But  the  real 
difference  between  the  two  is  fundamental,  prodig 
ious,  —  measurable  only  by  thousands  of  years.  It 
is  the  difference  between  compulsory  and  free 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          279 

cooperation,  —  the  difference  between  the  most 
despotic  form  of  communism,  founded  upon  the 
most  ancient  form  of  religion,  and  the  most  highly 
evolved  form  of  industrial  union,  with  unlimited 
individual  right  of  competition. 

There  exists  a  popular  error  to  the  effect  that 
what  we  call  communism  and  socialism  in  Western 
civilization  are  modern  growths,  representing  aspira 
tion  toward  some  perfect  form  of  democracy.  As  a 
matter  of  fact  these  movements  represent  reversion, 
—reversion  toward  the  primitive  conditions  of  human 
society.  Under  every  form  of  ancient  despotism 
we  find  exactly  the  same  capacity  of  self-government: 
among  the  people :  it  was  manifested  by  the  old 
Egyptians  and  Peruvians  as  well  as  by  the  early 
Greeks  and  Romans ;  it  is  exhibited  to-day  by 
Hindoo  and  Chinese  communities ;  it  may  be 
studied  in  Siamese  or  Annamese  villages  quite  as 
well  as  in  Japan.  It  means  a  religious  communistic 
despotism,  —  a  supreme  social  tyranny  suppressing 
personality,  forbidding  enterprise,  and  making  com 
petition  a  public  offence.  Such  self-government 
also  has  its  advantages  :  it  was  perfectly  adapted  to 
the  requirements  of  Japanese  life  so  long  as  the 
nation  could  remain  isolated  from  the  rest  of  the 
world.  Yet  it  must  be  obvious  that  any  society 
whose  ethical  traditions  forbid  the  individual  to 
profit  at  the  cost  of  his  fellow-men  will  be  placed  at 
an  enormous  disadvantage  when  forced  into  the 


i8o         THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION 

industrial  struggle  for  existence  against  communities 
whose  self-government  permits  of  the  greatest 
possible  personal  freedom,  and  the  widest  range  of 
competitive  enterprise. 

We  might  suppose  that  perpetual  and  universal 
coercion,  moral  and  physical,  would  have  brought 
about  a  state  of  universal  sameness,  —  a  dismal 
uniformity  and  monotony  in  all  life's  manifestations. 
But  such  monotony  existed  only  as  to  the  life  of 
the  commune,  not  as  to  that  of  the  race.  The  most 
wonderful  variety  characterized  this  quaint  civiliza 
tion,  as  it  also  characterized  the  old  Greek  civiliza 
tion,  and  for  precisely  the  same  reasons.  In  every 
patriarchal  civilization  ruled  by  ancestor-worship,  all 
tendency  to  absolute  sameness,  to  general  uniform 
ity,  is  prevented  by  the  character  of  the  aggregate 
itself,  which  never  becomes  homogeneous  and 
plastic.  Every  unit  of  that  aggregate,  each  one  of 
the  multitude  of  petty  despotisms  composing  it, 
most  jealously  guards  its  own  particular  traditions 
and  customs,  and  remains  self-sufficing.  Hence 
results,  sooner  or  later,  incomparable  variety  of 
detail,  small  detail,  artistic,  industrial,  architectural, 
mechanical.  In  Japan  such  differentiation  and 
specialization  was  thus  maintained,  that  you  will 
hardly  find  in  the  whole  country  even  two  villages 
where  the  customs,  industries,  and  methods  of 
production  are  exactly  the  same.  .  .  .  The  cus- 


THE   SOCIAL   ORGANIZATION          281 

toms  of  the  fish  ing- villages  will,  perhaps,  best  illus 
trate  what  I  mean.  In  every  coast  district  the 
various  fishing-settlements  have  their  own  traditional 
ways  of  constructing  nets  and  boats,  and  their  own 
particular  methods  of  handling  them.  Now,  in  the 
time  of  the  great  tidal-wave  of  1896,  when  thirty 
thousand  people  perished,  and  scores  of  coast-villages 
were  wrecked,  large  sums  of  money  were  collected 
in  Kobe  and  elsewhere  for  the  benefit  of  the  sur 
vivors  ;  and  well-meaning  foreigners  attempted  to 
supply  the  want  of  boats  and  fishing  implements  by 
purchasing  quantities  of  locally  made  nets  and  boats, 
and  sending  them  to  the  afflicted  districts.  But  it 
was  found  that  these  presents  were  of  no  use  to  the 
men  of  the  northern  provinces,  who  had  been  accus 
tomed  to  boats  and  nets  of  a  totally  different  kind; 
and  it  was  further  discovered  that  every  fishing- 
hamlet  had  special  requirements  of  its  own  in  this 
regard.  .  .  .  Now  the  differentiations  of  habit  and 
custom,  thus  exhibited  in  the  life  of  the  fishing- 
communities,  is  paralleled  in  many  crafts  and  call 
ings.  The  way  of  building  houses,  and  of  roofing 
them,  differs  in  almost  every  province;  also  the 
methods  of  agriculture  and  of  horticulture,  the 
manner  of  making  wells,  the  methods  of  weaving 
and  lacquering  and  pottery-making  and  tile-baking. 
Nearly  every  town  and  village  of  importance  boasts 
of  some  special  production,  bearing  the  name  of  the 
place,  and  unlike  anything  made  elsewhere.  .  .  . 


u 

282          THE   SOCIAL    ORGANIZATION 

No  doubt  the  ancestral  cults  helped  to  conserve  and 
to  develop  such  local  specialization  of  industries  : 
the  craft-ancestors,  the  patron-gods  of  the  guild, 
were  supposed  to  desire  that  the  work  of  their 
descendants  and  worshippers  should  maintain  a 
particular  character  of  its  own.  Though  individual 
enterprise  was  checked  by  communal  regulation,  the 
specialization  of  local  production  was  encouraged  by 
difference  of  cults.  Family-conservatism  or  guild- 
conservatism  would  tolerate  small  improvements  or 
modifications  suggested  by  local  experience,  but 
would  be  wary,  perhaps  superstitious  likewise,  about 
accepting  the  results  of  strange  experience. 

Still,  for  the  Japanese  themselves,  not  the  least 
pleasure  of  travel  in  Japan  is  the  pleasure  of  study 
ing  the  curious  variety  in  local  production,  —  the 
pleasure  of  rinding  the  novel,  the  unexpected,  the 
unimagined.  Even  those  arts  or  industries  of  Old 
Japan,  primarily  borrowed  from  Korea  or  from 
China,  appear  to  have  developed  and  conserved 
innumerable  queer  forms  under  the  influence  of  the 
numberless  local  cults. 


The   Rise  of  the   Military   Power 


The  Rise  of  the  Military  Power 


A 


LMOST  the  whole  of  authentic  Japanese 
history  is  comprised  in  one  vast  episode : 
the  rise  and  fall  of  the  military  power.  .  .  . 


It  has  been  customary  to  speak  of  Japanese  history 
as  beginning  with  the  accession  of  Jimmu  Tenno, 
alleged  to  have  reigned  from  660  to  585  B.C.,  and 
to  have  lived  for  one  hundred  and  twenty-seven 
years.  Before  the  time  of  the  Emperor  Jimmu  was 
the  Age  of  the  Gods,  —  the  period  of  mythology. 
But  trustworthy  history  does  not  begin  for  a  thou 
sand  years  after  the  accession  of  Jimmu  Tenno;  and 
the  chronicles  of  those  thousand  years  must  be 
regarded  as  little  better  than  fairy-tales.  They  con 
tain  records  of  fact;  but  fact  and  myth  are  so  inter 
woven  that  it  is  difficult  to  distinguish  the  one  from 
the  other.  We  have  legends,  for  example,  of  an 
alleged  conquest  of  Korea  in  the  year  202  A.D.,  by 
the  Empress  Jingo ;  and  it  has  been  tolerably  well 
proved  that  no  such  conquest  took  place.1  The 
later  records  are  somewhat  less  mythical  than  the 
earlier.  We  have  traditions  apparently  founded  on 

1  See  Aston' s  paper,  Early  Japanese  History,  in  the  translations  of  the  Asiatic 
Society  of  Japan. 

285 


286     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

fact,  of  Korean  immigration  in  the  time  of  the 
fifteenth  ruler,  the  Emperor  Ojin ;  then  later  tradi 
tions,  also  founded  on  fact,  of  early  Chinese  studies 
in  Japan ;  then  some  vague  accounts  of  a  dis 
turbed  state  of  society,  which  appears  to  have  con 
tinued  through  the  whole  of  the  fifth  century. 
Buddhism  was  introduced  in  the  middle  of  the 
century  following  ;  and  we  have  record  of  the  fierce 
opposition  offered  to  the  new  creed  by  a  Shintd 
faction,  and  of  a  miraculous  victory  won  by  the  help 
of  the  Four  Deva  Kings,  at  the  prayer  of  Shotoku 
Taishi,  —  the  great  founder  of  Buddhism,  and 
regent  of  the  Empress  Suiko.  With  the  firm 
establishment  of  Buddhism  in  the  reign  of  that 
Empress  (593—628  A.D.),  we  reach  the  period  of 
authentic  history,  and  of  the  thirty-third  Japanese 
sovereign  counting  from  Jimmu  Tenno. 

But  although  everything  prior  to  the  seventh 
century  remains  obscured  for  us  by  the  mists  of 
fable,  much  can  be  inferred,  even  from  the  half- 
mythical  records,  concerning  social  conditions  dur 
ing  the  reigns  of  the  first  thirty-three  Emperors 
and  Empresses.  It  appears  that  the  early  Mikado 
lived  very  simply  —  scarcely  better,  indeed,  than 
their  subjects.  The  Shinto  scholar  Mabuchi  tells 
us  that  they  dwelt  in  huts  with  mud  walls  and  roofs 
of  shingle ;  that  they  wore  hempen  clothes ;  that 
they  carried  their  swords  in  simple  wooden  scab 
bards,  bound  round  with  the  tendrils  of  a  wild 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     287 

vine ;  that  they  walked  about  freely  among  the 
people  ;  that  they  carried  their  own  bows  and  arrows 
when  they  went  to  hunt.  But  as  society  developed 
wealth  and  power,  this  early  simplicity  disappeared ; 
and  the  gradual  introduction  of  Chinese  customs 
and  etiquette  effected  great  changes.  The  Empress 
Suiko  introduced  Chinese  court-ceremonies,  and 
first  established  among  the  nobility  the  Chinese 
grades  of  rank.  Chinese  luxury,  as  well  as  Chinese 
learning,  soon  made  its  appearance  at  court;  and 
thereafter  the  imperial  authority  appears  to  have 
been  less  and  less  directly  exerted.  The  new 
ceremonialism  must  have  rendered  the  personal 
exercise  of  the  multiform  imperial  functions  more 
difficult  than  before ;  and  it  is  probable  that  the 
temptation  to  act  more  or  less  by  deputy  would 
have  been  strong  even  in  the  case  of  an  energetic 
ruler.  At  all  events  we  find  that  the  real  adminis 
tration  of  government  began  about  this  time  to  pass 
into  the  hands  of  deputies,  —  all  of  whom  were 
members  of  the  great  Kuge  clan  of  the  Fujiwara. 

This  clan,  which  included  the  highest  hereditary 
priesthood,  represented  a  majority  of  the  ancient 
nobility,  claiming  divine  descent.  Ninety-five  out 
of  the  total  one  hundred  and  fifty-five  families  of 
Kuge  belonged  to  it,  —  including  the  five  families, 
Go-Sekke,  from  which  alone  the  Emperor  was  by 
tradition  allowed  to  choose  his  Empress.  Its  his 
toric  name  dates  only  from  the  reign  of  the  Emperor 


288     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

Kwammu  (782-806  A.D.),  who  bestowed  it  as  an 
honour  upon  Nakatomi  no  Kamatari ;  but  the  clan 
had  long  previously  held  the  highest  positions  at 
Court.  By  the  close  of  the  seventh  century 
most  of  the  executive  power  had  passed  into  its 
hands.  Later  the  office  of  Kwambaku,  or  Regent, 
was  established,  and  remained  hereditary  in  the 
house  down  to  modern  times  —  ages  after  all  real 
power  had  been  taken  from  the  descendants  of 
Nakatomi  no  Kamatari.  But  during  almost  five 
centuries  the  Fujiwara  remained  the  veritable  regents 
of  the  country,  and  took  every  possible  advantage 
of  their  position.  All  the  civil  offices  were  in  the 
hands  of  Fujiwara  men  ;  all  the  wives  and  favourites 
of  the  Emperors  were  Fujiwara  women.  The  whole 
power  of  government  was  thus  kept  in  the  hands 
of  the  clan ;  and  the  political  authority  of  the 
Emperor  ceased  to  exist.  Moreover  the  succession 
was  regulated  entirely  by  the  Fujiwara ;  and  even 
the  duration  of  each  reign  was  made  to  depend  upon 
their  policy.  It  was  deemed  advisable  to  compel 
Emperors  to  abdicate  at  an  early  age,  and  after 
abdicating  to  become  Buddhist  monks,  —  the  suc 
cessor  chosen  being  often  a  mere  child.  There  is 
record  of  an  Emperor  ascending  the  throne  at  the 
age  of  two,  and  abdicating  at  the  age  of  four ;  another 
Mikado  was  appointed  at  the  age  of  five ;  several  at 
the  age  of  ten.  Yet  the  religious  dignity  of  the 
throne  remained  undiminished,  or,  rather,  continued 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     289 

to  grow.  The  more  the  Mikado  was  withdrawn 
from  public  view  by  policy  and  by  ceremonial, 
the  more  did  his  seclusion  and  inaccessibility  serve 
to  deepen  the  awe  of  the  divine  legend.  Like  the 
Lama  of  Thibet  the  living  deity  was  made  invisible 
to  the  multitude ;  and  gradually  the  belief  arose 
that  to  look  upon  his  face  was  death.  ...  It  is 
said  that  the  Fujiwara  were  not  satisfied  even  with 
these  despotic  means  of  assuring  their  own  domina 
tion,  and  that  luxurious  forms  of  corruption  were 
maintained  within  the  palace  for  the  purpose  of 
weakening  the  character  of  young  emperors  who 
might  otherwise  have  found  the  energy  to  assert  the 
ancient  rights  of  the  throne. 

Perhaps  this  usurpation  —  which  prepared  the 
way  for  the  rise  of  the  military  power  —  has  never 
been  rightly  interpreted.  The  history  of  all  the 
patriarchal  societies  of  ancient  Europe  will  be  found 
to  illustrate  the  same  phase  of  social  evolution.  At 
a  certain  period  in  the  development  of  each  we  find 
the  same  thing  happening,  —  the  withdrawal  of  all 
political  authority  from  the  Priest-King,  who  is  suf 
fered,  nevertheless,  to  retain  the  religious  dignity. 
It  may  be  a  mistake  to  judge  the  policy  of  the  Fuji 
wara  as  a  policy  of  mere  ambition  and  usurpation. 
The  Fujiwara  were  a  religious  aristocracy,  claiming 
divine  origin,  —  clan-chiefs  of  a  society  in  which 
religion  and  government  were  identical,  and  holding 
to  that  society  much  the  same  relation  as  that  of  the 
u 


290    THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

Eupatrid*  to  the  ancient  Attic  society.  The  Mi 
kado  had  originally  become  supreme  magistrate, 
military  commander,  and  religious  head  by  consent 
of  a  majority  of  the  clan-chiefs,  —  each  of  whom 
represented  to  his  own  following  what  the  "  Heav 
enly  Sovereign  "  represented  to  the  social  aggregate. 
But  as  the  power  of  the  ruler  extended  with  the 
growth  of  the  nation,  those  who  had  formerly 
united  to  maintain  that  power  began  to  find  it  dan 
gerous.  They  decided  to  deprive  the  Heavenly 
Sovereign  of  all  political  and  legal  authority,  without 
disturbing  in  any  way  his  religious  supremacy.  At 
Athens,  at  Sparta,  at  Rome,  and  elsewhere  in  ancient 
Europe,  the  same  policy  was  carried  out,  for  the 
same  reasons,  by  religious  senates.  The  history  of 
the  early  kings  of  Rome,  as  interpreted  by  M.  de 
Coulanges,  best  illustrates  the  nature  of  the  antago 
nism  developed  between  the  priest-ruler  and  the 
religious  aristocracy  ;  but  the  same  thing  took  place 
in  all  the  Greek  communities,  with  about  the  same 
result.  Everywhere  political  power  was  taken  away 
from  the  early  kings  ;  but  they  were  mostly  left  in 
possession  of  their  religious  dignities  and  privileges  : 
they  remained  supreme  priests  after  having  ceased  to 
be  rulers.  This  was  the  case  also  in  Japan  ;  and  I 
imagine  that  future  Japanese  historians  will  be  able 
to  give  us  an  entirely  new  interpretation  of  the  Fu- 
jiwara  episode,  as  reviewed  in  the  light  of  modern 
sociology.  At  all  events,  there  can  be  little  doubt 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     291 

that,  in  curtailing  the  powers  of  the  Heavenly  Sov 
ereign,  the  religious  aristocracy  must  have  been 
actuated  by  conservative  precaution  as  well  as  b) 
ambition.  There  had  been  various  Emperors  who 
made  changes  in  the  laws  and  customs  —  changes 
which  could  scarcely  have  been  viewed  with  favour 
by  many  of  the  ancient  nobility  ;  there  had  been 
an  Emperor  whose  diversions  can  to-day  be  written 
of  only  in  Latin  ;  there  had  even  been  an  Emperor 
—  Kotoku —  who,  though  "God  Incarnate,"  and 
chief  of  the  ancient  faith,  "  despised  the  Way  of  the 
Gods,"  and  cut  down  the  holy  grove  of  the  shrine 
of  Iku-kuni-dama.  Kotoku,  for  all  his  Buddhist 
piety  (perhaps,  indeed,  because  of  it),  was  one  of  the 
wisest  and  best  of  rulers  ;  but  the  example  of  a 
heavenly  sovereign  cc  despising  the  Way  of  the 
Gods,"  must  have  given  the  priestly  clan  matter  for 
serious  reflection.  .  .  .  Besides,  there  is  another 
important  fact  to  be  noticed.  The  Imperial  house 
hold  proper  had  become,  in  the  course  of  centuries, 
entirely  detached  from  the  Uji ;  and  the  omnipo 
tence  of  this  unit,  independent  of  all  other  units, 
constituted  in  itself  a  grave  danger  to  aristocratic 
privileges  and  established  institutions.  Too  much 
might  depend  upon  the  personal  character  and  will 
of  an  omnipotent  God-King,  capable  of  breaking 
with  all  clan-custom,  and  of  abrogating  clan-privi 
leges.  On  the  other  hand,  there  was  safety  for  all 
alike  under  the  patriarchal  rule  of  the  clan,  which 


292     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

could  check  every  tendency  on  the  part  of  any  of  its 
members  to  exert  predominant  influence  at  the 
expense  of  the  rest.  But  for  obvious  reasons  the 
Imperial  cult  —  traditional  source  of  all  authority 
and  privilege  —  could  not  be  touched  :  it  was  only 
by  maintaining  and  reinforcing  it  that  the  religious 
nobility  could  expect  to  keep  the  real  power  in  their 
hands.  They  actually  kept  it  for  nearly  five  cen 
turies. 

The  history  of  all  the  Japanese  regencies,  how 
ever,  amply  illustrates  the  general  rule  that  inherited 
authority  is  ever  and  everywhere  liable  to  find  itself 
supplanted  by  deputed  authority.  The  Fujiwara 
appear  to  have  eventually  become  the  victims  of 
that  luxury  which  they  had  themselves,  for  reasons 
of  policy,  introduced  and  maintained.  Degenerat 
ing  into  a  mere  court-nobility,  they  made  little  effort 
to  exert  any  direct  authority  in  other  than  civil  direc 
tions,  entrusting  military  matters  almost  wholly  to 
the  Buke.  In  the  eighth  century  the  distinction 
between  military  and  civil  organization  had  been 
made  upon  the  Chinese  plan  ;  the  great  military 
class  then  came  into  existence,  and  began  to  extend 
its  power  rapidly.  Of  the  military  clans  proper,  the 
most  powerful  were  the  Minamoto  and  the  Taira. 
By  deputing  to  these  clans  the  conduct  of  all  im 
portant  matters  relating  to  war,  the  Fujiwara  eventu 
ally  lost  their  high  position  and  influence.  As  soon 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     293 

as  the  Buke  found  themselves  strong  enough  to  lay 
hands  upon  the  reins  of  government,  —  which  hap 
pened  about  the  middle  of  the  eleventh  century,  — 
the  Fujiwara  supremacy  became  a  thing  of  the  past, 
although  members  of  the  clan  continued  for  cen 
turies  to  occupy  positions  of  importance  under 
various  regents. 

But  the  Buke  could  not  realize  their  ambition 
without  a  bitter  struggle  among  themselves,  —  the 
longest  and  the  fiercest  war  in  Japanese  history. 
The  Minamoto  and  the  Taira  were  both  Kuge ; 
both  claimed  imperial  descent.  In  the  early  part  of 
the  contest  the  Taira  carried  all  before  them  ;  and 
it  seemed  that  no  power  could  hinder  them  from 
exterminating  the  rival  clan.  But  fortune  turned  at 
last  in  favour  of  the  Minamoto ;  and  at  the  famous 
sea-fight  of  Dan-no-ura,  in  1 1 85,  the  Taira  were 
themselves  exterminated. 

Then  began  the  reign  of  the  Minamoto  regents, 
or  rather  shogun.  I  have  elsewhere  said  that  the 
title  "  shogun "  originally  signified,  as  did  the 
Roman  military  term  Imperator^  only  a  commander- 
tn-chief :  it  now  became  the  title  of  the  supreme 
ruler  de  facto,  in  his  double  capacity  of  civil  and 
military  sovereign,  —  the  King  of  kings.  From  the 
accession  of  the  Minamoto  to  power  the  history  of 
the  shogunate  —  the  long  history  of  the  military 
supremacy  —  really  begins;  Japan  thereafter,  down 
to  the  present  era  of  Meiji,  having  really  two  Em- 


294     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

perors :  the  Heavenly  Sovereign,  or  Deity  Incar 
nate,  representing  the  religion  of  the  race ;  and  the 
veritable  Imperator,  who  wielded  all  the  powers  of 
the  administration.  No  one  sought  to  occupy  by 
force  the  throne  of  the  Sun's  Succession,  whence  all 
authority  was  at  least  supposed  to  be  derived.  Re 
gent  or  shogun  bowed  down  before  it:  divinity 
could  not  be  usurped. 

Yet  peace  did  not  follow  upon  the  battle  of  Dan- 
no-ura :  the  clan-wars  initiated  by  the  great  struggle 
of  the  Minamoto  and  the  Taira,  continued,  at  ir 
regular  intervals,  for  five  centuries  more  ;  and  the 
nation  remained  disintegrated.  Nor  did  the  Mina 
moto  long  keep  the  supremacy  which  they  had  so 
dearly  won.  Deputing  their  powers  to  the  Hoj5 
family,  they  were  supplanted  by  the  Hojo,  just  as  the 
Fujiwara  had  been  supplanted  by  the  Taira.  Three 
only  of  the  Minamoto  shogun  really  exercised  rule. 
During  the  whole  of  the  thirteenth  century,  and  for 
some  time  afterwards,  the  Hoj5  continued  to  govern 
the  country ;  and  it  is  noteworthy  that  these  regents 
never  assumed  the  title  of  shogun,  but  professed  to 
be  merely  shogunal  deputies.  Thus  a  triple-headed 
government  appeared  to  exist;  for  the  Minamoto 
kept  up  a  kind  of  court  at  Kamakura.  But  they 
faded  into  mere  shadows,  and  are  yet  remembered  by 
the  significant  appellation  of  "  Shadow-Shogun,"  or 
"  Puppet  Shogun."  There  was  nothing  shadowy, 
however,  about  the  administration  of  the  Hojo, — - 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     295 

men  of  immense  energy  and  ability.  By  them  Em 
peror  or  shogun  could  be  deposed  and  banished 
without  scruple  ;  and  the  helplessness  of  the  shogu- 
nate  can  be  inferred  from  the  fact,  that  the  seventh 
Hojo  regent,  before  deposing  the  seventh  shogun, 
sent  him  home  in  a  palanquin,  head  downwards  and 
heels  upwards.  Nevertheless  the  Hojd  suffered 
the  phantom-shogunate  to  linger  on,  until  1333. 
Though  unscrupulous  in  their  methods,  these  regents 
were  capable  rulers ;  and  proved  themselves  able 
to  save  the  country  in  a  great  emergency,  —  the 
famous  invasion  attempted  by  Kublai  Khan  in  1281. 
Aided  by  a  fortunate  typhoon,  which  is  said  to  have 
destroyed  the  hostile  fleet  in  answer  to  prayer  offered 
up  at  the  national  shrines,  the  Hojo  could  repel 
this  invasion.  They  were  less  successful  in  deal 
ing  with  certain  domestic  disorders,  —  especially 
those  fomented  by  the  turbulent  Buddhist  priest 
hood.  During  the  thirteenth  century,  Buddhism 
had  developed  into  a  great  military  power,  — 
strangely  like  that  church-militant  of  the  European 
middle  ages :  the  period  of  soldier-priests  and  fight 
ing-bishops.  The  Buddhist  monasteries  had  been 
converted  into  fortresses  filled  with  men-at-arms  ; 
Buddhist  menace  had  more  than  once  carried  terror 
into  the  sacred  seclusion  of  the  imperial  court.  At 
an  early  day,  Yoritomo,  the  far-seeing  founder  of 
the  Minamoto  dynasty,  had  observed  a  militant 
tendency  in  Buddhism,  and  had  attempted  to  check 


296     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

it  by  forbidding  all  priests  and  monks  either  to  beaf 
arms,  or  to  maintain  armed  retainers.  But  his  suc 
cessors  had  been  careless  about  enforcing  these  pro 
hibitions  ;  and  the  Buddhist  military  power  developed 
in  consequence  so  rapidly  that  the  shrewdest  H5J5 
were  doubtful  of  their  ability  to  cope  with  it. 
Eventually  this  power  proved  capable  of  giving  them 
serious  trouble.  The  ninety-sixth  Mikado,  Go- 
Daigo,  found  courage  to  revolt  against  the  tyranny 
of  the  Hojo ;  and  the  Buddhist  soldiery  took  part 
with  him.  He  was  promptly  defeated,  and  banished 
to  the  islands  of  Oki ;  but  his  cause  was  soon 
espoused  by  powerful  lords,  who  had  long  chafed 
under  the  despotism  of  the  regency.  These 
assembled  their  forces,  restored  the  banished  Em 
peror,  and  combined  in  a  desperate  attack  upon  the 
regent's  capital,  Kamakura.  The  city  was  stormed 
and  burned  ;  and  the  last  of  the  Hojo  rulers,  after  a 
brave  but  vain  defence,  performed  harakiri.  Thus 
shogunate  and  regency  vanished  together,  in  1333. 

For  the  moment  the  whole  power  of  administra 
tion  had  been  restored  to  the  Mikado.  Unfortu 
nately  for  himself  and  for  the  country,  Go-Daigo 
was  too  feeble  of  character  to  avail  himself  of  this 
great  opportunity.  He  revived  the  dead  shogunate 
by  appointing  his  own  son  shogun ;  he  weakly 
ignored  the  services  of  those  whose  loyalty  and 
courage  had  restored  him  ;  and  he  foolishly  strength-* 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     29* 

cned  the  hands  of  those  whom  he  had  every  reason 
to  fear.  As  a  consequence  there  happened  the  most 
serious  political  catastrophe  in  the  history  of  Japan, 
a  division  of  the  imperial  house  against  itself. 

The  unscrupulous  despotism  of  the  Hojo  regents 
had  prepared  the  possibility  of  such  an  event. 
During  the  last  years  of  the  thirteenth  century,  there 
were  living  at  the  same  time  in  Kyoto,  besides  the 
reigning  Mikado,  no  less  than  three  deposed  em 
perors.  To  bring  about  a  contest  for  the  succession 
was,  therefore,  an  easy  matter ;  and  this  was  soon 
accomplished  by  the  treacherous  general  Ashikaga 
Takeuji,  to  whom  Go-Daigo  had  unwisely  shown 
especial  favour.  Ashikaga  had  betrayed  the  Hojo 
in  order  to  help  the  restoration  of  Go-Daigo :  he 
subsequently  would  have  betrayed  the  trust  of  Go- 
Daigo  in  order  to  seize  the  administrative  power. 
The  Emperor  discovered  this  treasonable  purpose 
when  too  late,  and  sent  against  Ashikaga  an  army 
which  was  defeated.  After  some  further  contest 
Ashikaga  mastered  the  capital,  drove  Go-Daigo  a 
second  time  into  exile,  set  up  a  rival  Emperor,  and 
established  a  new  shogunate.  Now  for  the  first 
time,  two  branches  of  the  Imperial  family,  each 
supported  by  powerful  lords,  contended  for  the  right 
of  succession.  That  of  which  Go-Daigo  remained 
the  acting  representative,  is  known  in  history  as  the 
Southern  Branch  (Nancho\  and  by  Japanese  his 
torians  is  held  to  be  the  only  legitimate  branch* 


298     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

The  other  was  called  the  Northern  Branch  (Hokucho)^ 
and  was  maintained  at  Kyoto  by  the  power  of  the 
Ashikaga  clan ;  while  Go-Daigo,  finding  refuge  in 
a  Buddhist  monastery,  retained  the  insignia  of  em 
pire.  .  .  .  Thereafter,  for  a  period  of  fifty-six 
years  Japan  continued  to  have  two  Mikado ;  and 
the  resulting  disorder  was  such  as  to  imperil  the 
national  integrity.  It  would  have  been  no  easy 
matter  for  the  people  to  decide  which  Emperor 
possessed  the  better  claim.  Hitherto  the  imperial 
presence  had  represented  the  national  divinity ;  and 
the  imperial  palace  had  been  regarded  as  the  temple 
of  the  national  religion  :  the  division  maintained  by 
the  Ashikaga  usurpers  therefore  signified  nothing 
less  than  the  breaking  up  of  the  whole  tradition 
upon  which  existing  society  had  been  built.  The 
confusion  became  greater  and  greater,  the  danger 
increased  more  and  more,  until  the  Ashikaga  them 
selves  took  alarm.  They  managed  then  to  end  the 
trouble  by  persuading  the  fifth  Mikado  of  the 
Southern  Dynasty,  Go  Kameyama,  to  surrender  his 
insignia  to  the  reigning  Mikado  of  the  Northern 
Dynasty,  Go-Komatsu.  This  having  been  done,  in 
1392,  Go-Kameyama  was  honoured  with  the  title 
of  retired  Emperor,  and  Go-Komatsu  was  nationally 
acknowledged  as  legitimate  Emperor.  But  the 
names  of  the  other  four  Emperors  of  the  Northern 
Dynasty  are  still  excluded  from  the  official  list. 
The  Ashikaga  shogunate  thus  averted  the  supreme 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     299 

peril ;  but  the  period  of  this  military  domination, 
which  endured  until  1573,  was  destined  to  remain  the 
darkest  in  Japanese  history.  The  Ashikaga  gave  the 
country  fifteen  rulers,  several  of  whom  were  men  of 
great  ability  :  they  tried  to  encourage  industry  ;  they 
cultivated  literature  and  the  arts ;  but  they  could  not 
give  peace.  Fresh  disputes  arose  ;  and  lords  whom 
the  shogunate  could  not  subdue  made  war  upon 
each  other.  To  such  a  condition  of  terror  was  the 
capital  reduced  that  the  court  nobility  fled  from  it 
to  take  refuge  with  daimyo  powerful  enough  to  afford 
them  protection.  Robbery  became  rife  throughout 
the  land ;  and  piracy  terrorized  the  seas.  The 
sh5gunate  itself  was  reduced  to  the  humiliation  of 
paying  tribute  to  China.  Agriculture  and  industry 
at  last  ceased  to  exist  outside  of  the  domains  of  cer 
tain  powerful  lords.  Provinces  became  waste ;  and 
famine,  earthquake,  and  pestilence  added  their  horror 
to  the  misery  of  ceaseless  war.  The  poverty  pre 
vailing  may  be  best  imagined  from  the  fact  that 
when  the  Emperor  known  to  history  as  Go-Tsuchi- 
mikado  —  one  hundred  and  second  of  the  Sun's 
Succession  —  died  in  the  year  1500,  his  corpse  had 
to  be  kept  at  the  gates  of  the  palace  forty  days, 
because  the  expenses  of  the  funeral  could  not  be 
defrayed.  Until  1573  the  misery  continued;  and 
the  shogunate  meanwhile  degenerated  into  insignifi 
cance.  Then  a  strong  captain  arose  and  ended  the 
house  of  Ashikaga,  and  seized  the  reins  of  power. 


300     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

This  usurper  was  Oda  Nobunaga ;  and  the  usurpa 
tion  was  amply  provoked.  Had  it  not  occurred, 
Japan  might  never  have  entered  upon  an  era  of 
peace. 

For  there  had  been  no  peace  since  the  fifth  cen 
tury.  No  emperor  or  regent  or  shogun  had  ever 
been  able  to  impose  his  rule  firmly  upon  the  whole 
country.  Somewhere  or  other,  there  were  always 
wars  of  clan  with  clan.  By  the  time  of  the  six 
teenth  century  personal  safety  could  be  found  only 
under  the  protection  of  some  military  leader,  able  to 
exact  his  own  terms  for  the  favour  of  such  protection. 
The  question  of  the  imperial  succession,  —  which 
had  almost  wrecked  the  empire  during  the  four 
teenth  century,  —  might  be  raised  again  at  any  time 
by  some  reckless  faction,  with  the  probable  result 
of  ruining  civilization,  and  forcing  the  nation  back 
to  its  primitive  state  of  barbarism.  Never  did  the 
future  of  Japan  appear  so  dark  as  at  the  moment 
when  Oda  Nobunaga  suddenly  found  himself  the 
strongest  man  in  the  empire,  and  leader  of  the  most 
formidable  Japanese  army  that  had  ever  obeyed  a 
single  head.  This  man,  a  descendant  of  Shinto 
priests,  was  above  all  things  a  patriot.  He  did  not 
seek  the  title  of  shogun,  and  never  received  it.  His 
hope  was  to  save  the  country ;  and  he  saw  that  this 
could  be  done  only  by  centralizing  all  feudal  power 
under  one  control,  and  strenuously  enforcing  law. 
Looking  about  him  for  the  ways  and  means  of  effect- 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     301 

ing  this  centralization,  he  perceived  that  one  of  the 
very  first  obstacles  to  be  removed  was  that  created 
by  the  power  of  Buddhism  militant,  —  the  feudal 
Buddhism  developed  under  the  Hojo  regency,  and 
especially  represented  by  the  great  Shin  and  Tendai 
sects.  As  both  had  already  given  aid  to  his  ene 
mies,  it  was  easy  to  find  a  cause  for  quarrel ;  and  he 
first  proceeded  against  the  Tendai.  The  campaign 
was  conducted  with  ferocious  vigour;  the  monastery- 
fortresses  of  Hiyei-san  were  stormed  and  razed,  and 
all  the  priests,  with  all  their  adherents,  put  to  the 
sword  —  no  mercy  being  shown  even  to  women  and 
children.  By  nature  Nobunaga  was  not  cruel ;  but 
his  policy  was  ruthless,  and  he  knew  when  and  why 
to  strike  hard.  The  power  of  the  Tendai  sect 
before  this  massacre  may  be  imagined  from  the  fact 
that  three  thousand  monastery  buildings  were  burnt 
at  Hiyei-san.  The  Shin  sect  of  the  Hongwanji, 
with  headquarters  at  Osaka,  was  scarcely  less  power 
ful  ;  and  its  monastery,  occupying  the  site  of  the 
present  Osaka  castle,  was  one  of  the  strongest  for 
tresses  in  the  country.  Nobunaga  waited  several 
years,  merely  to  prepare  for  the  attack.  The  soldier- 
priests  defended  themselves  well;  upwards  of  fifty 
thousand  lives  are  said  to  have  been  lost  in  the 
siege ;  yet  only  the  personal  intervention  of  the 
Emperor  prevented  the  storming  of  the  stronghold, 
and  the  slaughter  of  every  being  within  its  walls. 
Through  respect  for  the  Emperor,  Nobunaga  agreed 


302    THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

to  spare  the  lives  of  the  Shin  priests :  they  were  onl) 
dispossessed  and  scattered,  and  their  power  forevei 
broken.  Buddhism  having  been  thus  effectually 
crippled,  Nobunaga  was  able  to  turn  his  attention 
to  the  warring  clans.  Supported  by  the  greatest 
generals  that  the  nation  ever  produced, —  Hideyoshi 
and  lyeyasu,  —  he  proceeded  to  enforce  pacification 
and  order ;  and  his  grand  purpose  would  probably 
have  been  soon  accomplished,  but  for  the  revengeful 
treachery  of  a  subordinate,  who  brought  about  his 
death  in  1582. 

Nobunaga,  with  Taira  blood  in  his  veins,  had 
been  essentially  an  aristocrat,  inheriting  all  the  apti 
tudes  of  his  great  race  for  administration,  and  versed 
in  all  the  traditions  of  diplomacy.  His  avenger 
and  successor,  Hideyoshi,  was  a  totally  different 
type  of  soldier:  a  son  of  peasants,  an  untrained 
genius  who  had  won  his  way  to  high  command  by 
shrewdness  and  courage,  natural  skill  of  arms,  and 
immense  inborn  capacity  for  all  the  chess-play  of 
war.  With  the  great  purpose  of  Nobunaga  he  had 
always  been  in  sympathy ;  and  he  actually  carried  it 
out,  —  subduing  the  entire  country,  from  north  to 
south,  in  the  name  of  the  Emperor,  by  whom  he 
was  appointed  Regent  (Kwambaku).  Thus  universal 
peace  was  temporarily  established.  But  the  vast 
military  powers  which  Hideyoshi  had  collected  and 
disciplined,  threatened  to  become  refractory.  He 
found  employment  for  them  by  declaring  unpro- 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     303 

voked  war  against  Korea,  whence  he  hoped  to  effect 
the  conquest  of  China.  The  war  with  Korea 
opened  in  1592,  and  dragged  on  unsatisfactorily 
until  1598,  when  Hideyoshi  died.  He  had  proved 
himself  one  of  the  greatest  soldiers  ever  born,  but 
not  one  of  the  best  among  rulers.  Perhaps  the 
issue  of  the  war  in  Korea  would  have  been  more 
fortunate,  if  he  could  have  ventured  to  conduct  it 
himself.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  merely  exhausted 
the  force  of  both  countries ;  and  Japan  had  little  to 
show  for  her  dearly  bought  victories  abroad  except 
the  Mimidzuka  or  "  Ear- Monument  "  at  Nara,  — 
marking  the  spot  where  thirty  thousand  pairs  of 
foreign  ears,  cut  from  the  pickled  heads  of  slain, 
were  buried  in  the  grounds  of  the  temple  of 
Daibutsu.  .  .  . 

Into  the  vacant  place  of  power  then  stepped  the 
most  remarkable  man  that  Japan  ever  produced,  — 
Tokugawa  lyeyasu.  lyeyasu  was  of  Minamoto 
descent,  and  an  aristocrat  to  the  marrow  of  his  bones. 
As  a  soldier  he  was  scarcely  inferior  to  Hideyoshi, 
whom  he  once  defeated,  —  but  he  was  much  more 
than  a  soldier:  a  far-sighted  statesman,  an  incom 
parable  diplomat,  and  something  of  a  scholar. 
Cool,  cautious,  secretive,  —  distrustful,  yet  generous, 
—  stern,  yet  humane,  —  by  the  range  and  the  versa 
tility  of  his  genius  he  might  be  not  unfavourably 
contrasted  with  Julius  Caesar.  All  that  Nobunaga 
and  Hideyoshi  had  wished  to  do,  and  failed  to 


304     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

do,  lyeyasu  speedily  accomplished.  After  fulfilling 
Hideyoshi's  dying  injunction,  not  to  leave  the 
troops  in  Korea  "  to  become  ghosts  haunting  a 
foreign  land,"  —  that  is  to  say,  in  the  condition  of 
spirits  without  a  cult,  —  lyeyasu  had  to  face  a  formi 
dable  league  of  lords  resolved  to  dispute  his  claim 
to  rule.  The  terrific  battle  of  Sekigahara  left  him 
master  of  the  country  ;  and  he  at  once  took  measures 
to  consolidate  his  power,  and  to  perfect,  even  to  the 
least  detail,  all  the  machinery  of  military  govern 
ment.  As  shogun,  he  reorganized  the  daimiates, 
redistributed  a  majority  of  fiefs  among  those  whom 
he  could  trust,  created  new  military  grades,  and 
ordered  and  so  balanced  the  powers  of  the  greater 
daimyo  as  to  make  it  next  to  impossible  for  them  to 
dare  a  revolt.  Later  on  the  daimyo  were  even 
required  to  furnish  security  for  their  good  behaviour: 
they  were  obliged  to  pass  a  certain  time  of  the 
year1  in  the  shogun's  capital,  leaving  their  families 
as  hostages  during  the  rest  of  the  year.  The  entire 
administration  was  readjusted  upon  a  simple  and 
sagacious  plan  ;  and  the  Laws  of  lyeyasu  prove  him 
to  have  been  an  excellent  legislator.  For  the  first 
time  in  Japanese  history  the  nation  was  integrated, 
—  integrated,  at  least,  in  so  far  as  the  peculiar  nature 
of  the  social  unit  rendered  possible.  The  counsels 

1The  period  of  obligatory  residence  in  Yedo  was  not  the  same  for  all  daimyo. 
In  some  cases  the  obligation  seems  to  have  extended  to  six  months ;  in  others,  the 
requirement  wa*  to  pass  every  alternate  year  in  the  capital. 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     305 

of  the  founder  of  Yedo  were  followed  by  his  suc 
cessors  ;  and  the  Tokugawa  shogunate,  which  lasted 
until  1867,  gave  the  country  fifteen  military 
sovereigns.  Under  these,  Japan  enjoyed  both  peace 
and  prosperity  for  the  time  of  two  hundred  and 
fifty  years ;  and  her  society  was  thus  enabled  to 
evolve  to  the  full  limit  of  its  peculiar  type.  Indus 
tries  and  arts  developed  in  new  and  wonderful  ways  ; 
literature  found  august  patronage.  The  national 
cult  was  carefully  maintained ;  and  all  precautions 
were  taken  to  prevent  the  occurrence  of  another 
such  contest  for  the  imperial  succession  as  had  nearly 
ruined  the  country  in  the  fourteenth  century. 

We  have  seen  that  the  history  of  military  rule  in 
Japan  embraces  nearly  the  whole  period  of  authentic 
history,  down  to  modern  times,  and  closes  with  the 
second  period  of  national  integration.  The  first 
period  had  been  reached  when  the  clans  first  ac 
cepted  the  leadership  of  the  chief  of  the  greatest 
clan,  —  thereafter  revered  as  the  Heavenly  Sover 
eign,  Supreme  Pontiff,  Supreme  Arbiter,  Supreme 
Commander,  and  Supreme  Magistrate.  How  long 
a  time  was  required  for  this  primal  integration,  under 
a  patriarchal  monarchy,  we  cannot  know ;  but  we 
have  learned  that  the  later  integration,  under  a 
duarchy,  occupied  considerably  more  than  a  thou 
sand  years.  .  .  .  Now  the  extraordinary  fact  to 
note  is  that,  during  all  those  centuries,  the  imperial 


306     THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER 

cult  was  carefully  maintained  by  even  the  enemies 
of  the  Mikado ;  the  only  legitimate  ruler  being 
in  national  belief,  the  Tenshi,  "  Son  of  Heaven," 
—  the  Tenno,  "Heavenly  King."  Through  every 
period  of  disorder  the  Offspring  of  the  Sun  was 
the  object  of  national  worship,  and  his  palace  the 
temple  of  the  national  faith.  Great  captains  might 
coerce  the  imperial  will ;  but  they  styled  themselves, 
none  the  less,  the  worshippers  and  slaves  of  thf. 
incarnate  deity ;  and  they  would  no  more  have 
thought  of  trying  to  occupy  his  throne,  than  the)'1 
would  have  thought  of  trying  to  abolish  all  religion 
by  decree.  Once  only,  by  the  arbitrary  folly  of  the 
Ashikaga  shogun,  the  imperial  cult  had  been  seri 
ously  interfered  with ;  and  the  social  earthquake 
consequent  upon  that  division  of  the  imperial  house, 
apprised  the  usurpers  of  the  enormity  of  their  blun 
der.  .  .  .  Only  the  integrity  of  the  imperial  succes 
sion,  the  uninterrupted  maintenance  of  the  imperial 
worship,  made  it  possible  even  for  lyeyasu  to  clamp 
together  the  indissoluble  units  of  society. 

Herbert  Spencer  has  taught  the  student  of  sociology 
to  recognize  that  religious  dynasties  have  extraordi 
nary  powers  of  longevity,  because  they  possess  ex 
traordinary  power  to  resist  change  ;  whereas  military 
dynasties,  depending  for  their  perpetuity  upon  the 
individual  character  of  their  sovereigns,  are  particu 
larly  liable  to  disintegration.  The  immense  dura 
tion  of  the  Japanese  imperial  dynasty,  as  contrasted 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  MILITARY  POWER     307 

with  the  history  of  the  various  shogunates  and 
regencies  representing  a  merely  military  domina 
tion,  illustrates  this  teaching  in  a  most  remarkable 
way.  Back  through  twenty-five  hundred  years  we 
can  follow  the  line  of  the  imperial  succession,  till 
it  vanishes  out  of  sight  into  the  mystery  of  the  past. 
Here  we  have  evidence  of  that  extreme  power  of 
resisting  all  changes  which  is  inherently  characteristic 
of  religious  conservatism ;  on  the  other  hand,  the 
history  of  sh5gunates  and  regencies  proves  the 
tendency  to  disintegration  of  institutions  having 
no  religious  foundation,  and  therefore  no  religious 
power  of  cohesion.  The  remarkable  duration  of 
the  Fujiwara  rule,  as  compared  with  others,  may 
perhaps  be  accounted  for  by  the  fact  that  the 
Fujiwara  represented  a  religious,  rather  than  a  mili 
tary,  aristocracy.  Even  the  marvellous  military 
structure  devised  by  lyeyasu  had  begun  to  decay 
before  alien  aggression  precipitated  its  inevitable 
collapse. 


The  Religion  of  Loyalty 


The   Religion   of  Loyalty 

"  11  yriLITANT  societies,"  says  the  author  of 
Y  I  tne  Principles  of  Sociology,  "  must  have  a 
patriotism  which  regards  the  triumph  of 
their  society  as  the  supreme  end  of  action ;  they 
must  possess  the  loyalty  whence  flows  obedience  to 
authority,  —  and,  that  they  may  be  obedient,  they 
must  have  abundant  faith. "  The  history  of  the 
Japanese  people  strongly  exemplifies  these  truths. 
Among  no  other  people  has  loyalty  ever  assumed 
more  impressive  and  extraordinary  forms ;  and 
among  no  other  people  has  obedience  ever  been 
nourished  by  a  more  abundant  faith,  —  that  faith 
derived  from  the  cult  of  the  ancestors. 

The  reader  will  understand  how  filial  piety  —  the 
domestic  religion  of  obedience  —  widens  in  range 
with  social  evolution,  and  eventually  differentiates 
both  into  that  political  obedience  required  by  the 
community,  and  that  military  obedience  exacted  by 
the  war-lord,  —  obedience  implying  not  only  sub 
mission,  but  affectionate  submission,  —  not  merely 
the  sense  of  obligation,  but  the  sentiment  of  duty. 
In  its  origin  such  dutiful  obedience  is  essentially 
religious ;  and,  as  expressed  in  loyalty,  it  retains  the 

3" 


3i2        THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY 

religious  character,  —  becomes  the  constant  manifes 
tation  of  a  religion  of  self-sacrifice.  Loyalty  is 
developed  early  in  the  history  of  a  militant  people ; 
and  we  find  touching  examples  of  it  in  the  earliest 
Japanese  chronicles.  We  find  also  terrible  ones,  — 
stories  of  self-immolation. 

To  his  divinely  descended  lord,  the  retainer 
owed  everything  —  in  fact,  not  less  than  in  theory  : 
goods,  household,  liberty,  and  life.  Any  or  all  of 
these  he  was  expected  to  yield  up  without  a  mur 
mur,  on  demand,  for  the  sake  of  the  lord.  And 
duty  to  the  lord,  like  the  duty  to  the  family  ances 
tor,  did  not  cease  with  death.  As  the  ghosts  of 
parents  were  to  be  supplied  with  food  by  their 
living  children,  so  the  spirit  of  the  lord  was  to  be 
worshipfully  served  by  those  who,  during  his  life 
time,  owed  him  direct  obedience.  It  could  not  be 
permitted  that  the  spirit  of  the  ruler  should  enter 
unattended  into  the  world  of  shadows :  some,  at 
least,  of  those  who  served  him  living  were  bound 
to  follow  him  in  death.  Thus  in  early  societies 
arose  the  custom  of  human  sacrifices,  —  sacrifices 
at  first  obligatory,  afterwards  voluntary.  In  Japan, 
as  stated  in  a  former  chapter,  they  remained  an 
indispensable  feature  of  great  funerals,  up  to  the 
first  century,  when  images  of  baked  clay  were  first 
substituted  for  the  official  victims.  I  have  already 
mentioned  how,  after  this  abolition  of  obligatory 


THE    RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY         313 

junshi,  or  following  of  one's  lord  in  death,  the  prac 
tice  of  voluntary  junshi  continued  up  to  the  six 
teenth  century,  when  it  actually  became  a  military 
fashion.  At  the  death  of  a  daimyo  it  was  then 
common  for  fifteen  or  twenty  of  his  retainers  to 
disembowel  themselves.  lyeyasu  determined  to 
put  an  end  to  this  custom  of  suicide,  which  is  thus 
considered  in  the  y6th  article  of  his  celebrated 
Legacy :  — 

"  Although  it  is  undoubtedly  the  ancient  custom  for  a 
vassal  to  follow  his  Lord  in  death,  there  is  not  the  slightest 
reason  in  the  practice.  Confucius  has  ridiculed  the  making 
of  To  {effigies  buried  with  the  dead^ .  These  practices  are 
strictly  forbidden,  more  especially  to  primary  retainers,  but 
to  secondary  retainers  likewise,  even  of  the  lowest  rank. 
He  is  the  reverse  of  a  faithful  servant  who  disregards  this 
prohibition.  His  posterity  shall  be  impoverished  by  the 
confiscation  of  his  property,  as  a  warning  for  those  who 
disobey  the  laws." 

lyeyasu's  command  ended  the  practice  of  junshi 
among  his  own  vassals  ;  but  it  continued,  or  revived 
again,  after  his  death.  In  1664  the  shogunate  issued 
an  edict  proclaiming  that  the  family  of  any  person 
performing  junshi  should  be  punished ;  and  the 
shogunate  was  in  earnest.  When  this  edict  was 
disobeyed  by  one  Uyemon  no  Hyoge,  who  disem 
bowelled  himself  at  the  death  of  his  lord,  Okudaira 
Tadamasa,  the  government  promptly  confiscated  the 
lands  of  the  family  of  the  suicide,  executed  two  of 


3 14         THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY 

his  sons,  and  sent  the  rest  of  the  household  into 
exile.  Though  cases  of  junshi  have  occurred  even 
within  this  present  era  of  Meiji,  the  determined  atti 
tude  of  the  Tokugawa  government  so  far  checked 
the  practice  that  even  the  most  fervid  loyalty  lat 
terly  made  its  sacrifices  through  religion,  as  a  rule. 
Instead  of  performing  harakiriy  the  retainer  shaved 
his  head  at  the  death  of  his  lord,  and  became  a 
Buddhist  monk. 

The  custom  of  junshi  represents  but  one  aspect 
of  Japanese  loyalty :  there  were  other  customs 
equally,  if  not  even  more,  significant,  —  for  example, 
the  custom  of  military  suicide,  not  as  junshi,  but  as 
a  self-inflicted  penalty  exacted  by  the  traditions  of 
samurai  discipline.  Against  harakiri,  as  punitive 
suicide,  there  was  no  legislative  enactment,  for  obvi 
ous  reasons.  It  would  seem  that  this  form  of  self- 
destruction  was  not  known  to  the  Japanese  in  early 
ages  ;  it  may  have  been  introduced  from  China,  with 
other  military  customs.  The  ancient  Japanese  usu 
ally  performed  suicide  by  strangulation,  as  the  Ni- 
hongi  bears  witness.  It  was  the  military  class  that 
established  the  harakiri  as  a  custom  and  privilege. 
Previously,  the  chiefs  of  a  routed  army,  or  the 
defenders  of  a  castle  taken  by  storm,  would  thus 
end  themselves  to  avoid  falling  into  the  enemy's 
hands,  — a  custom  which  continued  into  the  present 
era.  About  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century,  the 


THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY         315 

military  custom  of  permitting  any  samurai  to  per 
form  harakiri,  instead  of  subjecting  him  to  the  shame 
of  execution,  appears  to  have  been  generally  estab 
lished.  Afterwards  it  became  the  recognized  duty 
of  a  samurai  to  kill  himself  at  the  word  of  command. 
All  samurai  were  subject  to  this  disciplinary  law, 
even  lords  of  provinces ;  and  in  samurai  families, 
children  of  both  sexes  were  trained  how  to  perform 
suicide  whenever  personal  honour  or  the  will  of  a 
liege-lord,  might  require  it.  ...  Women,  I  should 
observe,  did  not  perform  harakiri,  but  jigai,  —  that 
is  to  say,  piercing  the  throat  with  a  dagger  so  as  to 
sever  the  arteries  by  a  single  thrust-and-cut  move 
ment.  .  .  .  The  particulars  of  the  harakiri  ceremony 
have  become  so  well  known  through  Mitford's  trans 
lation  of  Japanese  texts  on  the  subject,  that  I  need 
not  touch  upon  them.  The  important  fact  to  remem 
ber  is  that  honour  and  loyalty  required  the  samurai 
man  or  woman  to  be  ready  at  any  moment  to  per 
form  self-destruction  by  the  sword.  As  for  the 
warrior,  any  breach  of  trust  (voluntary  or  involun 
tary),  failure  to  execute  a  difficult  mission,  a  clumsy 
mistake,  and  even  a  look  of  displeasure  from  one's 
liege,  were  sufficient  reasons  for  harakiri,  or,  as  the 
aristocrats  preferred  to  call  it,  by  the  Chinese  term, 
seppuku.  Among  the  highest  class  of  retainers,  it 
was  also  a  duty  to  make  protest  against  misconduct 
on  the  part  of  their  lord  by  performing  seppuku, 
when  all  other  means  of  bringing  him  to  reason  had 


316        THE   RELIGION   OF  LOYALTY 

failed,  —  which  heroic  custom  has  been  made  the 
subject  of  several  popular  dramas  founded  upon 
fact.  In  the  case  of  married  women  of  the  samurai 
class,  —  directly  responsible  to  their  husbands,  not 
to  the  lord,  — jigai  was  resorted  to  most  often  as  a 
means  of  preserving  honour  in  time  of  war,  though 
it  was  sometimes  performed  merely  as  a  sacrifice  of 
loyalty  to  the  spirit  of  the  husband,  after  his  un 
timely  death.1  In  the  case  of  girls  it  was  not 
uncommon  for  other  reasons,  —  samurai  maidens 
often  entering  into  the  service  of  noble  households, 
where  the  cruelty  of  intrigue  might  easily  bring 
about  a  suicide,  or  where  loyalty  to  the  wife  of  the 
lord  might  exact  it.  For  the  samurai  maiden  in 
service  was  bound  by  loyalty  to  her  mistress  not 
less  closely  than  the  warrior  to  the  lord;  and  the 
heroines  of  Japanese  feudalism  were  many. 

In  the  early  ages  it  appears  to  have  been  the 
custom  for  the  wives  of  officials  condemned  to  death 
to  kill  themselves ;  —  the  ancient  chronicles  are  full 
of  examples.  But  this  custom  is  perhaps  to  be 
partly  accounted  for  by  the  ancient  law,  which  held 
the  household  of  the  offender  equally  responsible 
with  him  for  the  offence,  independently  of  the  facts 
in  the  case.  However,  it  was  certainly  also  common 
enough  for  a  bereaved  wife  to  perform  suicide,  not 
through  despair,  but  through  the  wish  to  follow  her 

1  The  Japanese  moralist  Yekken  wrote  :  "  A  woman  has  no  feudal  lord  :  she 
must  reverence  and  obey  her  husband. ' ' 


THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY         317 

husband  into  the  other  world,  and  there  to  wait 
upon  him  as  in  life.  Instances  of  female  suicide, 
representing  the  old  ideal  of  duty  to  a  dead  husband, 
have  occurred  in  recent  times.  Such  suicides  are 
usually  performed  according  to  the  feudal  rules,  — 
the  woman  robing  herself  in  white  for  the  occasion. 
At  the  time  of  the  late  war  with  China  there  occurred 
in  Tokyd  one  remarkable  suicide  of  this  kind ;  the 
victim  being  the  wife  of  Lieutenant  Asada,  who  had 
fallen  in  battle.  She  was  only  twenty-one.  On 
hearing  of  her  husband's  death,  she  at  once  began 
to  make  preparations  for  her  own,  —  writing  letters 
of  farewell  to  her  relatives,  putting  her  affairs  in 
order,  and  carefully  cleaning  the  house,  according 
to  old-time  rule.  Thereafter  she  donned  her  death- 
robe  ;  laid  mattings  down  opposite  to  the  alcove  in 
the  guest-room ;  placed  her  husband's  portrait  in 
the  alcove,  and  set  offerings  before  it.  When 
everything  had  been  arranged,  she  seated  herself 
before  the  portrait,  took  up  her  dagger,  and  with 
a  single  skilful  thrust  divided  the  arteries  of  her 
throat. 

Besides  the  duty  of  suicide  for  the  sake  of  preserv 
ing  honour,  there  was  also,  for  the  samurai  woman, 
the  duty  of  suicide  as  a  moral  protest.  I  have 
already  said  that  among  the  highest  class  of  retainers 
it  was  thought  a  moral  duty  to  perform  harakiri  as 
a  remonstrance  against  shameless  conduct  on  the 
part  of  one's  lord,  when  all  other  means  of  persua- 


318         THE   RELIGION    OF   LOYALTY 

sion  had  been  tried  in  vain.  Among  samurav 
women  —  taught  to  consider  their  husbands  as  their 
lords,  in  the  feudal  meaning  of  the  term  —  it  was  held 
a  moral  obligation  to  perform  jigaiy  by  way  of  pro 
test  against  disgraceful  behaviour  upon  the  part  of  a 
husband  who  would  not  listen  to  advice  or  reproof. 
The  ideal  of  wifely  duty  which  impelled  such  sacri 
fice  still  survives  ;  and  more  than  one  recent  example 
might  be  cited  of  a  generous  life  thus  laid  down  in 
rebuke  of  some  moral  wrong.  Perhaps  the  most 
touching  instance  occurred  in  1892,  at  the  time  of 
the  district  elections  in  Nagano  prefecture.  A  rich 
voter  named  Ishijima,  after  having  publicly  pledged 
himself  to  aid  in  the  election  of  a  certain  candidate, 
transferred  his  support  to  the  rival  candidate.  On 
learning  of  this  breach  of  promise,  the  wife  of  Ishi 
jima,  robed  herself  in  white,  and  per  formed  jigai  after 
the  old  samurai  manner.  The  grave  of  this  brave 
woman  is  still  decorated  with  flowers  by  the  people 
of  the  district ;  and  incense  is  burned  before  her 
tomb. 

To  kill  oneself  at  command  —  a  duty  which  no 
loyal  samurai  would  have  dreamed  of  calling  in 
question  —  appears  to  us  much  less  difficult  than 
another  duty,  also  fully  accepted  :  the  sacrifice  of 
children,  wife,  and  household  for  the  sake  of  the 
lord.  Much  of  Japanese  popular  tragedy  is  devoted 
to  incidents  of  such  sacrifice  made  by  retainers  or 


THE    RELIGION    OF   LOYALTY         319 

dependents  of  daimyo, —  men  or  women  who  gave 
their  children  to  death  in  order  to  save  the  children 
of  their  masters.1  Nor  have  we  any  reason  to  sup 
pose  that  the  facts  have  been  exaggerated  in  these 
dramatic  compositions,  most  of  which  are  based 
upon  feudal  history.  The  incidents,  of  course,  have 
been  rearranged  and  expanded  to  meet  theatrical  re 
quirements  ;  but  the  general  pictures  thus  given  of 
the  ancient  society  are  probably  even  less  grim  than 
the  vanished  reality.  The  people  still  love  these 
tragedies ;  and  the  foreign  critic  of  their  dramatic 
literature  is  wont  to  point  out  only  the  blood-spots, 
and  to  comment  upon  them  as  evidence  of  a  public 
taste  for  gory  spectacles,  —  as  proof  of  some  innate 
ferocity  in  the  race.  Rather,  I  think,  is  this  love  of 
the  old  tragedy  proof  of  what  foreign  critics  try 
always  to  ignore  as  much  as  possible,  —  the  deeply 
religious  character  of  the  people.  These  plays  con 
tinue  to  give  delight,  —  not  because  of  their  horror, 
but  because  of  their  moral  teaching,  —  because  of 
their  exposition  of  the  duty  of  sacrifice  and  courage, 
the  religion  of  loyalty.  They  represent  the  martyr 
doms  of  feudal  society  for  its  noblest  ideals. 

All  down  through  that  society,  in  varying  forms, 
the  same  spirit  of  loyalty  had  its  manifestations. 
As  the  samurai  to  his  liege-lord,  so  the  apprentice 
was  bound  to  the  patron,  and  the  clerk  to  the  mer- 

1  See,  for  a  good  example,  the  translation  of  the  drama  Tcrakoyat  published, 
with  admirable  illustrations,  by  T.  Hasegawa  (Tokyo). 


320        THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY 

chant.  Everywhere  there  was  trust,  because  every 
where  there  existed  the  like  sentiment  of  mutual 
duty  between  servant  and  master.  Each  industry 
and  occupation  had  its  religion  of  loyalty,  —  requir 
ing,  on  the  one  side,  absolute  obedience  and  sacrifice 
at  need ;  and  on  the  other,  kindliness  and  aid. 
And  the  rule  of  the  dead  was  over  all. 

Not  less  ancient  than  the  duty  of  dying  for  parent 
or  lord  was  the  social  obligation  to  avenge  the  kill 
ing  of  either.  Even  before  the  beginnings  of  settled 
society,  this  duty  is  recognized.  The  oldest  chron 
icles  of  Japan  teem  with  instances  of  obligatory  ven 
geance.  Confucian  ethics  more  than  affirmed  the 
obligation,  —  forbidding  a  man  to  live  "  under  the 
same  heaven"  with  the  slayer  of  his  lord,  or  parent, 
or  brother ;  and  fixing  all  the  degrees  of  kinship,  or 
other  relationship,  within  which  the  duty  of  ven 
geance  was  to  be  considered  imperative.  Confucian 
ethics,  it  will  be  remembered,  became  at  an  early 
date  the  ethics  of  the  Japanese  ruling-classes,  and  so 
remained  down  to  recent  times.  The  whole  Confu 
cian  system,  as  I  have  remarked  elsewhere,  was 
founded  upon  ancestor-worship,  and  represented 
scarcely  more  than  an  amplification  and  elaboration 
of  filial  piety :  it  was  therefore  in  complete  accord 
with  Japanese  moral  experience.  As  the  military 
power  developed  in  Japan,  the  Chinese  code  of  ven 
geance  became  universally  accepted  ;  and  it  was  sus- 


THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY         321 

tained  by  law  as  well  as  by  custom  in  later  ages, 
lyeyasu  himself  maintained  it  —  exacting  only  that 
preliminary  notice  of  an  intended  vendetta  should 
be  given  in  writing  to  the  district  criminal  court.  The 
text  of  his  article  on  the  subject  is  interesting:  — 

"  In  respect  to  avenging  injury  done  to  master  or  father, 
it  is  acknowledged  by  the  Wise  and  Virtuous  [Confucius] 
that  you  and  the  injurer  cannot  live  together  under  the 
canopy  of  heaven.  A  person  harbouring  such  vengeance 
shall  give  notice  in  writing  to  the  criminal  court ;  and  al 
though  no  check  or  hindrance  may  be  offered  to  the  carry 
ing  out  of  his  design  within  the  period  allowed  for  that 
purpose,  it  is  forbidden  that  the  chastisement  of  an  enemy 
be  attended  with  riot.  Fellows  who  neglect  to  give  notice 
of  their  intended  revenge  are  like  wolves  of  pretext : l  their 
punishment  or  pardon  should  depend  upon  the  circum 
stances  of  the  case." 

Kindred,  as  well  as  parents ;  teachers,  as  well  as 
lords,  were  to  be  revenged.  A  considerable  propor 
tion  of  popular  romance  and  drama  is  devoted  to 
the  subject  of  vengeance  taken  by  women ;  and,  as 
a  matter  of  fact,  women,  and  even  children,  some 
times  became  avengers  when  there  were  no  men  of  a 
wronged  family  left  to  perform  the  duty.  Appren 
tices  avenged  their  masters  ;  and  even  sworn  friends 
were  bound  to  avenge  each  other. 

1  Or  "hypocritical  wolves-"  —  that  is  to  say,  brutal  murderers  seeking  to  excuse 
their  crime  on  the  pretext  oi  justifiable  vengeance.  (The  translation  is  by  Lowder.  ) 

Y 


322         THE   RELIGION    OF   LOYALTY 

Why  the  duty  of  vengeance  was  not  confined  to 
the  circle  of  natural  kinship  is  explicable,  of  course, 
by  the  peculiar  organization  of  society.  We  have 
seen  that  the  patriarchal  family  was  a  religious  cor 
poration  ;  and  that  the  family-bond  was  not  the 
bond  of  natural  affection,  but  the  bond  of  the  cult. 
We  have  also  seen  that  the  relation  of  the  house 
hold  to  the  community,  and  of  the  community  to 
the  clan,  and  of  the  clan  to  the  tribe,  was  equally 
a  religious  relation.  As  a  necessary  consequence, 
the  earlier  customs  of  vengeance  were  regulated  by 
the  bond  of  the  family,  communal,  or  tribal  cult, 
as  well  as  by  the  bond  of  blood ;  and  with  the 
introduction  of  Chinese  ethics,  and  the  develop 
ment  of  militant  conditions,  the  idea  of  revenge  as 
duty  took  a  wider  range.  The  son  or  the  brother 
by  adoption  was  in  respect  of  obligation  the  same  as 
the  son  or  brother  by  blood  ;  and  the  teacher  stood 
to  his  pupil  in  the  relation  of  father  to  child.  To 
strike  one's  natural  parent  was  a  crime  punishable 
by  death :  to  strike  one's  teacher  was,  before  the 
law,  an  equal  offence.  This  notion  of  the  teacher's 
claim  to  filial  reverence  was  of  Chinese  importation : 
an  extension  of  the  duty  of  filial  piety  to  "  the 
father  of  the  mind."  There  were  other  such  exten 
sions  ;  and  the  origin  of  all,  Chinese  or  Japanese, 
may  be  traced  alike  to  ancestor-worship. 

Now,  what  has  never  been  properly  insisted 
upon,  in  any  of  the  books  treating  of  ancient 


THE    RELIGION    OF    LOYALTY         323 

Japanese  customs,  is  the  originally  religious  sig 
nificance  of  the  kataki-uchi.  That  a  religious  origin 
can  be  found  for  all  customs  of  vendetta  established 
in  early  societies  is,  of  course,  well  known  ;  but  a 
peculiar  interest  attaches  to  the  Japanese  vendetta 
in  view  of  the  fact  that  it  conserved  its  religious 
character  unchanged  down  to  the  present  era.  The 
kataki-uchi  was  essentially  an  act  of  propitiation,  as 
is  proved  by  the  rite  with  which  it  terminated, — 
the  placing  of  the  enemy's  head  upon  the  tomb  of 
the  person  avenged,  as  an  offering  of  atonement. 
And  one  of  the  most  impressive  features  of  this 
rite,  as  formerly  practised,  was  the  delivery  of  an 
address  to  the  ghost  of  the  person  avenged.  Some 
times  the  address  was  only  spoken  ;  sometimes  it 
was  also  written,  and  the  manuscript  left  upon 
the  tomb. 

There  is  probably  none  of  my  readers  unac 
quainted  with  Mitford's  ever-delightful  Tales  of 
Old  Japan,  and  his  translation  of  the  true  story  of 
the  "  Forty-Seven  Ronins."  But  I  doubt  whether 
many  persons  have  noticed  the  significance  of  the 
washing  of  Kira  Kotsuke-no-Suke's  severed  head, 
or  the  significance  of  the  address  inscribed  to  their 
dead  lord  by  the  brave  men  who  had  so  long  waited 
and  watched  for  the  chance  to  avenge  him.  This 
address,  of  which  I  quote  Mitford's  translation,  was 
laid  upon  the  tomb  of  the  Lord  Asano.  It  is  stilJ 
preserved  at  the  temple  called  Sengakuji :  — 


324         THE   RELIGION    OF    LOYALTY 


"  The  fifteenth  year  of  Genroku  [//oj]  ,  the  twelfth  month, 
the  fifteenth  day.  —  We  have  come  this  day  to  do  homage 
here  :  forty-seven  men  in  all,  from  Oishi  Kuranosuke 
down  to  the  foot-soldier  Terasaka  Kichiyemon,  —  all 
cheerfully  about  to  lay  down  our  lives  on  your  behalf. 
We  reverently  announce  this  to  the  honoured  spirit  of 
our  dead  master.  On  the  fourteenth  day  of  the  third 
month  of  last  year,  our  honoured  master  was  pleased  to 
attack  Kira  Kotsuke-no-Suke,  for  what  reason  we  know 
not.  Our  honoured  master  put  an  end  to  his  own  life  ; 
but  Kira  Kotsuke-no-Suke  lived.  Although  we  fear  that 
after  the  decree  issued  by  the  Government,  this  plot  of 
ours  will  be  displeasing  to  our  honoured  master,  still  we, 
who  have  eaten  of  your  food,  could  not  without  blushing 
repeat  the  verse,  "  Thou  shalt  not  live  under  the  same  heaven, 
nor  tread  the  same  earth  with  the  enemy  of  thy  father  or  lord" 
nor  could  we  have  dared  to  leave  hell  [Hades]  and  present 
ourselves  before  you  in  Paradise,  unless  we  had  carried  out 
the  vengeance  which  you  began.  Every  day  that  we  waited 
seemed  as  three  autumns  to  us.  Verily  we  have  trodden 
the  snow  for  one  day,  nay,  for  two  days,  and  have  tasted  food 
but  once.  The  old  and  decrepit,  the  sick  and  the  ailing, 
have  come  forth  gladly  to  lay  down  their  lives.  Men 
might  laugh  at  us,  as  at  grasshoppers  trusting  in  the 
strength  of  their  arms,  and  thus  shame  our  honoured  lord; 
but  we  could  not  halt  in  our  deed  of  vengeance.  Having 
taken  counsel  together  last  night,  we  have  escorted  my 
Lord  Kosuke-no-Suke  hither  to  your  tomb.  This  dirk, 
by  which  our  honoured  lord  set  great  store  last  year,  and 
entrusted  to  our  care,  we  now  bring  back.  If  your  noble 
spirit  be  now  present  before  this  tomb,  we  pray  you,  as  a 


THE    RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY         325 

sign,  to  take  the  dirk,  and,  striking  the  head  of  your  enemy 
with  it  a  second  time,  to  dispel  your  hatred  forever.  This 
is  the  respectful  statement  of  forty-seven  men." 

It  will  be  observed  that  the  Lord  Asano  is  ad 
dressed  as  if  he  were  present  and  visible.  The 
head  of  the  enemy  has  been  carefully  washed,  ac 
cording  to  the  rule  concerning  the  presentation  of 
heads  to  a  living  superior.  It  is  laid  upon  the  tomb 
together  with  the  nine-inch  sword,  or  dagger,  origi 
nally  used  by  the  Lord  Asano  in  performing  harakiri 
at  Government  command,  and  afterwards  used  by 
Oishi  Kuranosuke  in  cutting  off  the  head  of  Kira 
K5tsuke-no-Suke ; —  and  the  spirit  of  the  Lord 
Asano  is  requested  to  take  up  the  weapon  and  to 
strike  the  head,  so  that  the  pain  of  ghostly  anger  may 
be  dissipated  forever.  Then,  having  been  them 
selves  all  sentenced  to  perform  harakiri^  the  forty- 
seven  retainers  join  their  lord  in  death,  and  are  buried 
in  front  of  his  tomb.  Before  their  graves  the  smoke 
of  incense,  offered  by  admiring  visitors,  has  been 
ascending  daily  for  two  hundred  years.1 

One  must  have  lived  in  Japan,  and  have  been 
able  to  feel  the  true  spirit  of  the  old  Japanese  life, 
in  order  to  comprehend  the  whole  of  this  romance  of 
loyalty  ;  but  I  think  that  whoever  carefully  reads  Mr. 
Mitford's  version  of  it,  and  his  translation  of  the 

1  It  has  been  long  the  custom  also  for  visitors  to  leave  their  cards  upon  the 
tombs  of  the  Forty-seven  Ronin.  When  I  last  visited  Sengakuji,  the  ground 
about  the  tombs  was  white  with  visiting-cards. 


326         THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY 

authentic  documents  relating  to  it,  will  confess  himself 
moved.  That  address  especially  touches,  —  because 
of  the  affection  and  the  faith  to  which  it  testifies, 
and  the  sense  of  duty  beyond  this  life.  How 
ever  much  revenge  must  be  condemned  by  our 
modern  ethics,  there  is  a  noble  side  to  many  of 
the  old  Japanese  stories  of  loyal  vengeance ;  and 
these  stories  affect  us  by  the  expression  of  what 
has  nothing  to  do  with  vulgar  revenge,  —  by  their 
exposition  of  gratitude,  self-denial,  courage  in  facing 
death,  and  faith  in  the  unseen.  And  this  means, 
of  course,  that  we  are,  consciously  or  uncon 
sciously,  impressed  by  their  religious  quality.  Mere 
individual  revenge  —  the  postponed  retaliation  for 
some  personal  injury — repels  our  moral  feeling: 
we  have  learned  to  regard  the  emotion  inspiring 
such  revenge  as  simply  brutal  —  something  shared 
by  man  with  lower  forms  of  animal  life.  But  in  the 
story  of  a  homicide  exacted  by  the  sentiment  of 
duty  or  gratitude  to  a  dead  master,  there  may  be  cir 
cumstances  which  can  make  appeal  to  our  higher 
moral  sympathies,  —  to  our  sense  of  the  force  and 
beauty  of  unselfishness,  unswerving  fidelity,  un 
changing  affection.  And  the  story  of  the  Forty- 
Seven  Ronin  is  one  of  this  class.  .  .  . 

Yet  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  old  Jap 
anese  religion  of  loyalty,  which  found  its  supreme 
manifestation  in  those  three  terrible  customs  of 


THE   RELIGION    OF   LOYALTY         327 

junshi,  harakiri,  and  kataki-uchi,  was  narrow  in  its 
range.  It  was  limited  by  the  very  constitution  of 
society.  Though  the  nation  was  ruled,  through  all 
its  groups,  by  notions  of  duty  everywhere  similar 
in  character,  the  circle  of  that  duty,  for  each  indi 
vidual,  did  not  extend  beyond  the  clan-group  to 
which  he  belonged.  For  his  own  lord  the  retainer 
was  always  ready  to  die ;  but  he  did  not  feel 
equally  bound  to  sacrifice  himself  for  the  military 
government,  unless  he  happened  to  belong  to  the 
special  military  following  of  the  Shogun.  His 
fatherland,  his  country,  his  world,  extended  only 
to  the  boundary  of  his  chief's  domain.  Outside  of 
that  domain  he  could  be  only  a  wanderer,  —  a  ronin, 
or  "  wave-man,"  as  the  masterless  samurai  was 
termed.  Under  such  conditions  that  larger  loyalty 
which  identifies  itself  with  love  of  king  and  country> 
—  which  is  patriotism  in  the  modern,  not  in  the 
narrower  antique  sense, —  could  not  fully  evolve. 
Some  common  peril,  some  danger  to  the  whole 
race  —  such  as  the  attempted  Tartar  conquest  of 
Japan  —  might  temporarily  arouse  the  true  senti 
ment  of  patriotism;  but  otherwise  that  sentiment 
had  little  opportunity  for  development.  The  Ise 
cult  represented,  indeed,  the  religion  of  the  nation, 
as  distinguished  from  the  clan  or  tribal  worship ; 
but  each  man  had  been  taught  to  believe  that  his 
first  duty  was  to  his  lord.  One  cannot  efficiently 
serve  two  masters ;  and  feudal  government  practi- 


328         THE    RELIGION    OF    LOYALTY 

cally  suppressed  any  tendencies  in  that  direction. 
The  lordship  so  completely  owned  the  individual, 
body  and  soul,  that  the  idea  of  any  duty  to  the 
nation,  outside  of  the  duty  to  the  chief,  had  neither 
time  nor  chance  to  define  itself  in  the  mind  of  the 
vassal.  To  the  ordinary  samurai,  for  example,  an 
imperial  order  would  not  have  been  law :  he  recog 
nized  no  law  above  the  law  of  his  daimyo.  As  for 
the  daimyo,  he  might  either  disobey  or  obey  an 
imperial  command  according  to  circumstances:  his 
direct  superior  was  the  sh5gun ;  and  he  was  obliged 
to  make  for  himself  a  politic  distinction  between  the 
Heavenly  Sovereign  as  deity,  and  the  Heavenly 
Sovereign  as  a  human  personality.  Before  the  ulti 
mate  centralization  of  the  military  power,  there  were 
many  instances  of  lords  sacrificing  themselves  for 
their  emperor ;  but  there  were  even  more  cases  of 
open  rebellion  by  lords  against  the  imperial  will. 
Under  the  Tokugawa  rule,  the  question  of  obeying 
or  resisting  an  imperial  command  would  have  de 
pended  upon  the  attitude  of  the  sh5gun ;  and  no 
daimyo  would  have  risked  such  obedience  to  the 
court  at  Kyoto  as  might  have  signified  disobedience 
to  the  court  at  Yedo.  Not  at  least  until  the  sho- 
gunate  had  fallen  into  decay.  In  lyemitsu's  time 
the  daimyo  were  strictly  forbidden  to  approach  the 
imperial  palace  on  their  way  to  Yedo,  —  even  in 
response  to  an  imperial  command ;  and  they  were 
also  forbidden  to  make  any  direct  appeal  to  the 


THE   RELIGION    OF   LOYALTY         329 

Mikado.  The  policy  of  the  shogunate  was  to  pre 
vent  all  direct  communication  between  the  Kyoto 
court  and  the  daimyo.  This  policy  paralyzed  in 
trigue  for  two  hundred  years ;  but  it  prevented  the 
development  of  patriotism. 

And  for  that  very  reason,  when  Japan  at  last 
found  herself  face  to  face  with  the  unexpected  peril 
of  Western  aggression,  the  abolition  of  the  daimiates 
was  felt  to  be  a  matter  of  paramount  importance. 
The  supreme  danger  required  that  the  social  units 
should  be  fused  into  one  coherent  mass,  capable  of 
uniform  action,  —  that  the  clan  and  tribal  groupings 
should  be  permanently  dissolved,  —  that  all  author 
ity  should  immediately  be  centred  in  the  repre 
sentative  of  the  national  religion,  —  that  the  duty  of 
obedience  to  the  Heavenly  Sovereign  should  replace, 
at  once  and  forever,  the  feudal  duty  of  obedience  to 
the  territorial  lord.  The  religion  of  loyalty,  evolved 
by  a  thousand  years  of  war,  could  not  be  cast  away : 
properly  utilized,  it  would  prove  a  national  heritage 
of  incalculable  worth,  —  a  moral  power  capable  of 
miracles  if  directed  by  one  wise  will  to  a  single  wise 
end.  Destroyed  by  reconstruction  it  could  not  be; 
but  it  could  be  diverted  and  transformed.  Diverted^ 
therefore,  to  nobler  ends  —  expanded  to  larger  needs, 
—  it  became  the  new  national  sentiment  of  trust 
and  duty :  the  modern  sense  of  patriotism.  What 
wonders  it  has  wrought,  within  the  space  of  thirty 
years,  the  world  is  now  obliged  to  confess :  what 


330         THE   RELIGION   OF   LOYALTY 

more  it  may  be  able  to  accomplish  remains  to  be 
seen.  One  thing  at  least  is  certain,  —  that  the 
future  of  Japan  must  depend  upon  the  maintenance 
of  this  new  religion  of  loyalty,  evolved,  through  the 
old,  from  the  ancient  religion  of  the  dead. 


The  Jesuit  Peril 


The  Jesuit   Peril 

THE  second  half  of  the  sixteenth  century  is 
the  most  interesting  period  in  Japanese  his 
tory  —  for  three  reasons.  First,  because  it 
witnessed  the  apparition  of  those  mighty  captains, 
Nobunaga,  Hideyoshi,  and  lyeyasu, —  types  of  men 
that  a  race  seems  to  evolve  for  supreme  emergencies 
only,  —  types  requiring  for  their  production  not 
merely  the  highest  aptitudes  of  numberless  genera 
tions,  but  likewise  an  extraordinary  combination  of 
circumstances.  Secondly,  this  period  is  all-impor 
tant  because  it  saw  the  first  complete  integration  of 
the  ancient  social  system,  —  the  definitive  union 
of  all  the  clan-lordships  under  a  central  military 
government.  And  lastly,  the  period  is  of  special 
interest  because  the  incident  of  the  first  attempt  to 
christianize  Japan  —  the  story  of  the  rise  and  fall 
of  the  Jesuit  power  —  properly  belongs  to  it. 

The  sociological  significance  of  this  episode  is 
instructive.  Excepting,  perhaps,  the  division  of  the 
imperial  house  against  itself  in  the  twelfth  century, 
the  greatest  danger  that  ever  threatened  Japanese 
national  integrity  was  the  introduction  of  Christianity 

333 


334  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

by  the  Portuguese  Jesuits.  The  nation  saved  itself 
only  by  ruthless  measures,  at  the  cost  of  incalculable 
suffering  and  of  myriads  of  lives. 

It  was  during  the  period  of  great  disorder  pre 
ceding  Nobunaga's  effort  to  centralize  authority, 
that  this  unfamiliar  disturbing  factor  was  introduced 
by  Xavier  and  his  followers.  Xavier  landed  at 
Kagoshima  in  1549;  and  by  1581  the  Jesuits  had 
upwards  of  two  hundred  churches  in  the  country. 
This  fact  alone  sufficiently  indicates  the  rapidity 
with  which  the  new  religion  spread  ;  and  it  seemed 
destined  to  extend  over  the  entire  empire.  In  1585 
a  Japanese  religious  embassy  was  received  at  Rome ; 
and  by  that  date  no  less  than  eleven  daimyo, —  or 
"  kings,"  as  the  Jesuits  not  inaptly  termed  them  — 
had  become  converted.  Among  these  were  several 
very  powerful  lords.  The  new  creed  had  made 
rapid  way  among  the  common  people  also  :  it  was 
becoming  cc  popular,"  in  the  strict  meaning  of  the 
word. 

When  Nobunaga  rose  to  power,  he  favoured  the 
Jesuits  in  many  ways  —  not  because  of  any  sym 
pathy  with  their  creed,  for  he  never  dreamed  of 
becoming  a  Christian,  but  because  he  thought  that 
their  influence  would  be  of  service  to  him  in  his 
campaign  against  Buddhism.  Like  the  Jesuits 
themselves,  Nobunaga  had  no  scruple  about  means 
in  his  pursuit  of  ends.  More  ruthless  than  William 
the  Conqueror,  he  did  not  hesitate  to  put  to  death 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  335 

his  own  brother  and  his  own  father-in-law,  when 
they  dared  to  oppose  his  will.  The  aid  and  pro 
tection  which  he  extended  to  the  foreign  priests, 
for  merely  political  reasons,  enabled  them  to  develop 
their  power  to  a  degree  which  soon  gave  him  cause 
for  repentance.  Mr.  Gubbins,  in  his  "  Review  of 
the  Introduction  of  Christianity  into  China  and 
Japan,'*  quotes  from  a  Japanese  work,  called  Ibuki 
Mogusa,  an  interesting  extract  on  the  subject:  — 

"  Nobunaga  now  began  to  regret  his  previous  policy 
in  permitting  the  introduction  of  Christianity.  He  ac 
cordingly  assembled  his  retainers,  and  said  to  them:  — c  The 
conduct  of  these  missionaries  in  persuading  people  to  join 
them  by  giving  money,  does  not  please  me.  How  would 
it  be,  think  you,  if  we  were  to  demolish  Nambanji  [The 
w  Temple  of  the  Southern  Savages39  —  so  the  Portuguese  church 
was  called^  ? '  To  this  Mayeda  Tokuzenin  replied :  — 
'  It  is  now  too  late  to  demolish  the  Temple  of  the  Nam- 
ban.  To  endeavour  to  arrest  the  power  of  this  religion 
now  is  like  trying  to  arrest  the  current  of  the  ocean. 
Nobles,  both  great  and  small,  have  become  adherents  of  it. 
If  you  would  exterminate  this  religion  now,  there  is  fear 
that  disturbance  should  be  created  among  your  own  re 
tainers.  I  am  therefore  of  opinion  that  you  should  aban 
don  your  intention  of  destroying  Nambanji.'  Nobunaga 
in  consequence  regretted  exceedingly  his  previous  action 
in  regard  to  the  Christian  religion,  and  set  about  thinking 
how  he  could  root  it  out." 

The  assassination  of  Nobunaga  in  1586  may 
have  prolonged  the  period  of  toleration.  His  sue 


336  THE   JESUIT   PERIL 

cessor  Hideyoshi,  who  judged  the  influence  of  the 
foreign  priests  dangerous,  was  for  the  moment  oc 
cupied  with  the  great  problem  of  centralizing  the 
military  power,  so  as  to  give  peace  to  the  country. 
But  the  furious  intolerance  of  the  Jesuits  in  the 
southern  provinces  had  already  made  them  many 
enemies,  eager  to  avenge  the  cruelties  of  the  new 
creed.  We  read  in  the  histories  of  the  missions 
about  converted  daimyo  burning  thousands  of 
Buddhist  temples,  destroying  countless  works  of 
art,  and  slaughtering  Buddhist  priests  ;  —  and  we 
find  the  Jesuit  writers  praising  these  crusades  as 
evidence  of  holy  zeal.  At  first  the  foreign  faith  had 
been  only  persuasive ;  afterwards,  gathering  power 
under  Nobunaga's  encouragement,  it  became  coer 
cive  and  ferocious.  A  reaction  against  it  set  in 
about  a  year  after  Nobunaga's  death.  In  1587 
Hideyoshi  destroyed  the  mission  churches  in  Kyoto, 
Osaka,  and  Sakai,  and  drove  the  Jesuits  from  the 
capital ;  and  in  the  following  year  he  ordered  them 
to  assemble  at  the  port  of  Hirado,  and  prepare  to 
leave  the  country.  They  felt  themselves  strong 
enough  to  disobey  :  instead  of  leaving  Japan,  they 
scattered  through  the  country,  placing  themselves 
under  the  protection  of  various  Christian  daimyo. 
Hideyoshi  probably  thought  it  impolitic  to  push 
matters  further :  the  priests  kept  quiet,  and  ceased 
to  preach  publicly ;  and  their  self-effacement  served 
them  well  until  1591.  In  that  year  the  advent  of 


THE   JESUIT   PERIL  337 

certain  Spanish  Franciscans  changed  the  state  of 
affairs.  These  Franciscans  arrived  in  the  train  of 
an  embassy  from  the  Philippines,  and  obtained  leave 
to  stay  in  the  country  on  condition  that  they  were 
not  to  preach  Christianity.  They  broke  their  pledge, 
abandoned  all  prudence,  and  aroused  the  wrath  of 
Hideyoshi.  He  resolved  to  make  an  example  ;  and 
in  1597  he  had  six  Franciscans,  three  Jesuits,  and 
several  other  Christians  taken  to  Nagasaki  and  there 
crucified.  The  attitude  of  the  great  Taik5  toward  the 
foreign  creed  had  the  effect  of  quickening  the  re 
action  against  it,  —  a  reaction  which  had  already 
begun  to  show  itself  in  various  provinces.  But 
Hideyoshi's  death  in  1598  enabled  the  Jesuits  to 
hope  for  better  fortune.  His  successor,  the  cold 
and  cautious  lyeyasu,  allowed  them  to  hope,  and 
even  to  reestablish  themselves  in  Kyoto,  Osaka,  and 
elsewhere.  He  was  preparing  for  the  great  contest 
which  was  to  be  decided  by  the  battle  of  Sekiga- 
hara ;  —  he  knew  that  the  Christian  element  was 
divided,  —  some  of  its  leaders  being  on  his  own 
side,  and  some  on  the  side  of  his  enemies;  —  and 
the  time  would  have  been  ill  chosen  for  any  repres 
sive  policy.  But  in  1606,  after  having  solidly  es 
tablished  his  power,  lyeyasu  for  the  first  time  showed 
himself  decidedly  opposed  to  Christianity  by  issuing 
an  edict  forbidding  further  mission  work,  and  pro 
claiming  that  those  who  had  adopted  the  foreign 
religion  must  abandon  it.  Nevertheless  the  prop- 


338  THE   JESUIT   PERIL 

aganda  went  on  —  conducted  no  longer  by  Jesuits 
only,  but  also  by  Dominicans  and  Franciscans. 
The  number  of  Christians  then  in  the  empire  is 
said,  with  gross  exaggeration,  to  have  been  nearly 
two  millions.  But  lyeyasu  neither  took,  nor  caused 
to  be  taken,  any  severe  measures  of  repression  until 
1614,  —  from  which  date  the  great  persecution  may 
be  said  to  have  begun.  Previously  there  had  been 
local  persecutions  only,  conducted  by  independent 
daimyo, —  not  by  the  central  government.  The 
local  persecutions  in  Kyushu,  for  example,  would 
seem  to  have  been  natural  consequences  of  the  in 
tolerance  of  the  Jesuits  in  the  days  of  their  power, 
when  converted  daimyo  burned  Buddhist  temples 
and  massacred  Buddhist  priests ;  and  these  persecu 
tions  were  most  pitiless  in  those  very  districts  — 
such  as  Bungo,  Omura,  and  Higo  —  where  the 
native  religion  had  been  most  fiercely  persecuted  at 
Jesuit  instigation.  But  from  1614  —  at  which  date 
there  remained  only  eight,  out  of  the  total  sixty-four 
provinces  of  Japan,  into  which  Christianity  had  not 
been  introduced  —  the  suppression  of  the  foreign 
creed  became  a  government  matter ;  and  the  perse 
cution  was  conducted  systematically  and  uninter 
ruptedly  until  every  outward  trace  of  Christianity 
had  disappeared. 

The  fate    of  the    missions,  therefore,  was  really 
settled  by   lyeyasu  and    his   immediate  successors  ; 


THE   JESUIT   PERIL  339 

and  it  is  the  part  taken  by  lyeyasu  that  especially 
demands  attention.  Of  the  three  great  captains,  all 
had,  sooner  or  later,  become  suspicious  of  the  for 
eign  propaganda  ;  but  only  lyeyasu  could  find  both 
the  time  and  the  ability  to  deal  with  the  social  prob 
lem  which  it  had  aroused.  Even  Hideyoshi  had 
been  afraid  to  complicate  existing  political  troubles 
by  any  rigorous  measures  of  an  extensive  character, 
lyeyasu  long  hesitated.  The  reasons  for  his  hesita 
tion  were  doubtless  complex,  and  chiefly  diplomatic. 
He  was  the  last  of  men  to  act  hastily,  or  suffer 
himself  to  be  influenced  by  prejudice  of  any  sort ; 
and  to  suppose  him  timid  would  be  contrary  to  all 
that  we  know  of  his  character.  He  must  have 
recognized,  of  course,  that  to  extirpate  a  religion 
which  could  claim,  even  in  exaggeration,  more  than 
a  million  of  adherents,  was  no  light  undertaking,  and 
would  involve  an  immense  amount  of  suffering.  To 
cause  needless  misery  was  not  in  his  nature  :  he  had 
always  proved  himself  humane,  and  a  friend  of  the 
common  people.  But  he  was  first  of  all  a  states 
man  and  patriot ;  and  the  main  question  for  him 
must  have  been  the  probable  relation  of  the  foreign 
creed  to  political  and  social  conditions  in  Japan. 
This  question  required  long  and  patient  investiga 
tion  ;  and  he  appears  to  have  given  it  all  possible 
attention.  At  last  he  decided  that  Roman  Chris 
tianity  constituted  a  grave  political  danger  and  that 
its  extirpation  would  be  an  unavoidable  necessity. 


340  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

The  fact  that  the  severe  measures  which  he  and  his 
successors  enforced  against  Christianity  —  measures 
steadily  maintained  for  upwards  of  two  hundred 
years  —  failed  to  completely  eradicate  the  creed, 
proves  how  deeply  the  roots  had  struck.  Superfi 
cially,  all  trace  of  Christianity  vanished  to  Japanese 
eyes;  but  in  1865  there  were  discovered  near 
Nagasaki  some  communities  which  had  secretly 
preserved  among  themselves  traditions  of  the  Ro 
man  forms  of  worship,  and  still  made  use  of  Portu 
guese  and  Latin  words  relating  to  religious  matters. 

To  rightly  estimate  the  decision  of  lyeyasu  — 
one  of  the  shrewdest,  and  also  one  of  the  most 
humane  statesmen  that  ever  lived,  —  it  is  necessary 
to  consider,  from  a  Japanese  point  of  view,  the 
nature  of  the  evidence  upon  which  he  was  impelled 
to  act.  Of  Jesuit  intrigues  in  Japan  he  must  have 
had  ample  knowledge  —  several  of  them  having 
been  directed  against  himself;  —  but  he  would  have 
been  more  likely  to  consider  the  ultimate  object  and 
probable  result  of  such  intrigues,  than  the  mere  fact 
of  their  occurrence.  Religious  intrigues  were  com 
mon  among  the  Buddhists,  and  would  scarcely  at 
tract  the  notice  of  the  military  government  except 
when  they  interfered  with  state  policy  or  public 
order.  But  religious  intrigues  having  for  their  object 
the  overthrow  of  government,  and  a  sectarian  domi 
nation  of  the  country,  would  be  gravely  considered. 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  341 

Nobunaga  had  taught  Buddhism  a  severe  lesson  about 
the  danger  of  such  intriguing.  lyeyasu  decided  that 
the  Jesuit  intrigues  had  a  political  object  of  the  most 
ambitious  kind  ;  but  he  was  more  patient  than  Nobu 
naga.  By  1603  he  had  every  district  of  Japan  under 
his  yoke  ;  but  he  did  not  issue  his  final  edict  until 
eleven  years  later.  It  plainly  declared  that  the  foreign 
priests  were  plotting  to  get  control  of  the  government, 
and  to  obtain  possession  of  the  country  :  — 

"  The  Kirishitan  band  have  come  to  Japan,  not  only 
sending  their  merchant-vessels  to  exchange  commodities, 
but  also  longing  to  disseminate  an  evil  law,  to  overthrow 
right  doctrine,  so  that  they  may  change  the  government  of 
the  country,  and  obtain  possession  of  the  land.  This  is 
the  germ  of  great  disaster,  and  must  be  crushed.  .  .  . 

"  Japan  is  the  country  of  the  gods  and  of  the  Buddha : 
it  honours  the  gods,  and  reveres  the  Buddha.  .  .  .  The 
faction  of  the  Bateren  *  disbelieve  in  the  Way  of  the  Gods, 
and  blaspheme  the  true  Law,  —  violate  right-doing,  and 
injure  the  good.  .  .  .  They  truly  are  the  enemies  of  the 
gods  and  of  the  Buddha.  ...  If  this  be  not  speedily  pro 
hibited,  the  safety  of  the  state  will  assuredly  hereafter  be 
imperilled ;  and  if  those  who  are  charged  with  ordering  its 
affairs  do  not  put  a  stop  to  the  evil,  they  will  expose  them 
selves  to  Heaven's  rebuke. 

"  These  [missionaries]  must  be  instantly  swept  out,  so 
that  not  an  inch  of  soil  remains  to  them  in  Japan  on  which 

1  Batcren,  a  corruption  of  the  Portuguese  padre,  is  still  the  term  used  for  Roman 
Catholic  priests,  of  any  denomination. 


342  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

to  plant  their  feet ;  and  if  they  refuse  to  obey  this  com 
mand,  they  shall  suffer  the  penalty.  .  .  .  Let  Heaven  and 
the  Four  Seas  hear  this.  Obey  !  "  l 

It  will  be  observed  that  there  are  two  distinct 
charges  made  against  the  Bateren  in  this  document, 
—  that  of  political  conspiracy  under  the  guise  of 
religion,  with  a  view  to  getting  possession  of  the 
government ;  and  that  of  intolerance,  towards  both 
the  Shintd  and  the  Buddhist  forms  of  native  wor 
ship.  The  intolerance  is  sufficiently  proved  by  the 
writings  of  the  Jesuits  themselves.  The  charge  of 
conspiracy  was  less  easy  to  prove ;  but  who  could 
reasonably  have  doubted  that,  were  opportunity 
offered,  the  Roman  Catholic  orders  would  attempt 
to  control  the  general  government  precisely  as  they 
had  been  able  to  control  local  government  already 
in  the  lordships  of  converted  daimyo.  Besides,  we 
may  be  sure  that  by  the  time  at  which  the  edict  was 
issued,  lyeyasu  must  have  heard  of  many  matters 
likely  to  give  him  a  most  evil  opinion  of  Roman 
Catholicism  :  —  the  story  of  the  Spanish  conquests 
in  America,  and  the  extermination  of  the  West 
Indian  races ;  the  story  of  the  persecutions  in  the 
Netherlands,  and  of  the  work  of  the  Inquisition 
elsewhere;  the  story  of  the  attempt  of  Philip  II  to 
conquer  England,  and  of  the  loss  of  the  two  great 

1  The  entire  proclamation,  which  is  of  considerable  length,  has  been  translated 
by  Satow,  and  may  be  found  in  Vol.  VI,  part  I,  of  the  Transactions  of  the  Asiatic 
Society  of  Japan. 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  343 

Armadas.  The  edict  was  issued  in  1614,  and  lye- 
yasu  had  found  opportunity  to  inform  himself  about 
some  of  these  matters  as  early  as  1600.  In  that 
year  the  English  pilot  Will  Adams  had  arrived  at 
Japan  in  charge  of  a  Dutch  ship.  Adams  had 
started  on  this  eventful  voyage  in  the  year  1598, — • 
that  is  to  say,  just  ten  years  after  the  defeat  of  the 
first  Spanish  Armada,  and  one  year  after  the  ruin  of 
the  second.  He  had  seen  the  spacious  times  of 
great  Elizabeth  —  who  was  yet  alive;  —  he  had  very 
probably  seen  Howard  and  Seymour  and  Drake 
and  Hawkins  and  Frobisher  and  Sir  Richard  Gren- 
ville,  the  hero  of  1591.  For  this  Will  Adams  was 
a  Kentish  man,  who  had  "  serued  for  Master  and 
Pilott  in  her  Majesties  ships.  .  .  ."  The  Dutch 
vessel  was  seized  immediately  upon  her  arrival  at 
Kyushu  ;  and  Adams  and  his  shipmates  were  taken 
into  custody  by  the  daimyo  of  Bungo,  who  reported 
the  fact  to  lyeyasu.  The  advent  of  these  Protes 
tant  sailors  was  considered  an  important  event  by 
the  Portuguese  Jesuits,  who  had  their  own  reasons 
for  dreading  the  results  of  an  interview  between  such 
heretics  and  the  ruler  of  Japan.  But  lyeyasu  also 
happened  to  think  the  event  an  important  one;  and 
he  ordered  that  Adams  should  be  sent  to  him  at 
Osaka.  The  malevolent  anxiety  of  the  Jesuits 
about  the  matter  had  not  escaped  lyeyasu's  pene 
trating  observation.  They  endeavoured  again  and 
again  to  have  the  sailors  killed,  according  to  the 


344  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

written  statement  of  Adams  himself,  who  was  cer 
tainly  no  liar ;  and  they  had  been  able  in  Bungo  to 
frighten  two  scoundrels  of  the  ship's  company  into 
giving  false  testimony.1  "  The  lesuites  and  the 
Portingalls,"  wrote  Adams,  "gaue  many  euidences 
against  me  and  the  rest  to  the  Emperour  \Iyey asu\> 
that  we  were  theeues  and  robbers  of  all  nations, — 
and  [that]  were  we  suffered  to  Hue,  it  should  be 
against  the  profit  of  his  Highnes,  and  the  land." 
But  lyeyasu  was  perhaps  all  the  more  favourably 
inclined  towards  Adams  by  the  eagerness  of  the 
Jesuits  to  have  him  killed  —  "  crossed  [crucified] ," 
as  Aoams  called  it,  — "  the  custome  of  iustice  in 
japan,  as  hanging  is  iti  our  iand/'  He  gave  them 
answer,  says  Adams,  cc  that  we  had  as  yet  uot  doen 
to  him  nor  to  none  of  his  lande  any  harme  or  dam- 
mage  :  therefore  against  Reason  and  Iustice  tc  PUT: 
vs  to  death."  .  .  .  And  there  came  to  pass  pre 
cisely  what  the  Jesuits  had  most  feared,  —  what 
they  had  vainly  endeavoured  by  intimidation,  by 
slander,  by  all  possible  intrigue  to  prevent,  —  an 
interview  between  lyeyasu  and  the  heretic  Adams. 

1  "  Daily  more  and  more  the  Portugalls  incensed  the  justices  and  the  people 
against  vs.  And  two  of  our  men,  as  traytors,  gaue  themselves  in  seruice  to  the  king 
[daimyo])  beeing  all  in  all  with  the  Portugals,  hauing  by  them  their  Hues  warranted. 
The  one  was  called  Gilbert  de  Conning,  whose  mother  dwelleth  at  Middleborough, 
who  gaue  himself  out  to  be  marchant  of  all  the  goods  in  the  shippe.  The  other 
was  called  lobn  Abehon  Van  0-zuater.  These  traitours  sought  all  manner  of  wayes 
to  get  the  goods  into  their  hands,  and  made  known  vnto  them  all  things  that  had 
passed  in  our  voyage.  Nine  dayes  after  our  arriuall,  the  great  king  of  the  land 
[Iyeyasu~\  sent  for  me  to  come  vnto  him."  — Letter  of  Will  Adams  to  his  wife. 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  345 

"  Soe  that  as  soon  as  I  came  before  him,"  wrote 
Adams,  "  he  demanded  of  me  of  what  countrey  we 
were :  so  I  answered  him  in  all  points ;  for  there 
was  nothing  that  he  demanded  not,  both  concerning 
warre  and  peace  between  countrey  and  countrey  :  so 
that  the  particulars  here  to  wryte  would  be  too 
tedious.  And  for  that  time  I  was  commanded  to 
prison,  being  well  vsed,  with  one  of  our  mariners 
that  cam  with  me  to  serue  me."  From  another 
letter  of  Adams  it  would  seem  that  this  interview 
lasted  far  into  the  night,  and  that  lyeyasu's  ques 
tions  referred  especially  to  politics  and  religion. 
"  He  asked,"  says  Adams,  "  whether  our  countrey 
had  warres  ?  I  answered  him  yea,  with  the  Span 
iards  and  Portugals  —  beeing  in  peace  with  all  other 
nations.  Further  he  asked  me  in  what  I  did  be- 
leeue  ?  I  said,  in  God,  that  made  heauen  and 
earth.  He  asked  me  diverse  other  questions  of 
things  of  religion,  and  many  other  things :  As,  what 
way  we  came  to  the  country  ?  Having  a  chart  of 
the  whole  world,  I  shewed  him  through  the  Straight 
of  Magellan.  At  which  he  wondred,  and  thought 
me  to  lie.  Thus,  from  one  thing  to  another,  I 
abode  with  him  till  midnight."  .  .  .  The  two  men 
liked  each  other  at  sight,  it  appears.  Of  lyeyasu, 
Adams  significantly  observes :  "  He  viewed  me 
well,  and  seemed  to  be  wonderful  favourable."  Two 
days  later  lyeyasu  again  sent  for  Adams,  and  cross- 
questioned  him  just  about  those  matters  which  the 


346  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

Jesuits  wanted  to  remain  in  the  dark.  "  He  de- 
maunded  also  as  conserning  the  warres  between  the 
Spaniard  or  Portingall  and  our  countrey,  and  the 
reasons :  the  which  I  gaue  him  to  vnderstand  of  all 
things,  which  he  was  glad  to  heare,  as  it  seemed  to 
me.  In  the  end  I  was  commaunded  to  prisson  agein, 
but  my  lodging  was  bettered."  .  .  .  Adams  did 
not  see  lyeyasu  again  for  nearly  six  weeks  :  then  he 
was  sent  for,  and  cross-questioned  a  third  time. 
The  result  was  liberty  and  favour.  Thereafter,  at 
intervals,  lyeyasu  used  to  send  for  him ;  and  pres 
ently  we  hear  of  him  teaching  the  great  statesman 
"  some  points  of  jeometry,  and  understanding  of 
the  art  of  mathematickes,  with  other  things."  .  .  . 
lyeyasu  gave  him  many  presents,  as  well  as  a  good 
living,  and  commissioned  him  to  build  some  ships 
for  deep-sea  sailing.  Eventually,  the  poor  pilot  was 
created  a  samurai,  and  given  an  estate.  "  Being 
employed  in  the  Emperour's  seruice,"  he  wrote, 
"  he  hath  given  me  a  liuing,  like  vnto  a  lordship  in 
England,  with  eightie  or  ninetie  husbandmen  that 
be  as  my  slaues  or  seruents :  the  which,  or  the  like 
president  \_frecedeni\y  was  neuer  here  before  geven 
to  any  stranger."  .  .  .  Witness  to  the  influence  of 
Adams  with  lyeyasu  is  furnished  by  the  correspond 
ence  of  Captain  Cock,  of  the  English  factory,  who 
thus  wrote  home  about  him  in  1614:  "The  truth 
is  the  Emperour  esteemeth  hym  much,  and  he  may 
goe  in  and  speake  with  hym  at  all  times,  when 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  347 

kynges  and  princes  are  kept  ovt."  l  It  was  through 
this  influence  that  the  English  were  allowed  to  es 
tablish  their  factory  at  Hirado.  There  is  no 
stranger  seventeenth-century  romance  than  that 
of  this  plain  English  pilot,  —  with  only  his  simple 
honesty  and  common-sense  to  help  him,  —  rising 
to  such  extraordinary  favour  with  the  greatest  and 
shrewdest  of  all  Japanese  rulers.  Adams  was  never 
allowed,  however,  to  return  to  England,  —  perhaps 
because  his  services  were  deemed  too  precious  to 
lose.  He  says  himself  in  his  letters  that  lyeyasu 
never  refused  him  anything  that  he  asked  for,2  ex 
cept  the  privilege  of  revisiting  England :  when  he 
asked  that,  once  too  often,  the  "  ould  Emperour  " 
remained  silent. 

The  correspondence  of  Adams  proves  that  lye 
yasu  disdained  no  means  of  obtaining  direct  informa 
tion  about  foreign  affairs  in  regard  to  religion  and 
politics.  As  for  affairs  in  Japan,  he  had  at  his  dis 
posal  the  most  perfect  system  of  espionage  ever 

1  "It   has  plessed  God  to  bring  things  to  pass,  so  as  in  ye  eyes  of  ye  world 
[must  seem]  strange ;  for  the  Spaynnard  and  Portingall  hath  bin  my  bitter  enemies 
to  death  ;  and  now  theay  must  seek  to  me,  an  unworthy  wretch  j   for  the  Spayn- 
ard  as  well  as  the  Portingall  must  haue  all  their  negosshes  [negotiations'^  go  thorough 
my  hand."  — Letter  of  Adams  dated  January  12,   1613. 

2  Even  favours  for  the  people  who  had  sought  to  bring  about  his  death.      '  *  I 
pleased  him  so,"  wrote  Adams,  "that  what  I  said  he  would  not  contrarie.      At 
which  my  former  enemies  did  wonder  ;  and  at  this  time  must  entreat  me  to  do  them 
a  friendship,  which  to  both  Spaniards  and   Portingals  have  I  doen  :  recompencing 
them  good  for  euill.      So,  to  passe  my  time  to  get  my  liuing,  it  hath  cost  mee  great 
labour  and  trouble  at  the  first,  but  God  hath  blessed  my  labour." 


348  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

established ;  and  he  knew  all  that  was  going  on. 
Yet  he  waited,  as  we  have  seen,  fourteen  years 
before  he  issued  his  edict.  Hideyoshi's  edict  was, 
indeed,  renewed  by  him  in  1606;  but  that  referred 
particularly  to  the  public  preaching  of  Christianity  ; 
and  while  the  missionaries  outwardly  conformed  to 
the  law,  he  continued  to  suffer  them  within  his  own 
dominions.  Persecutions  were  being  carried  on  else 
where  ;  but  the  secret  propaganda  was  also  being 
carried  on,  and  the  missionaries  could  still  hope. 
Yet  there  was  menace  in  the  air,  like  the  heaviness 
preceding  storms.  Captain  Saris,  writing  from  Japan 
in  1613,  records  a  pathetic  incident  which  is  very 
suggestive.  "  I  gaue  leaue,"  he  says,  "  to  divers 
women  of  the  better  sort  to  come  into  my  Cabbin, 
where  the  picture  of  Venus^  with  her  sonne  Cupidt 
did  hang  somewhat  wantonly  set  out  in  a  large 
frame.  They,  thinking  it  to  bee  Our  Ladie  and 
her  sonne,  fell  downe  and  worshipped  it,  with  shewes 
of  great  deuotion,  telling  me  in  a  whispering  man 
ner  (that  some  of  their  own  companions,  which  were 
not  so,  might  not  heare),  that  they  were  Christianos  : 
whereby  we  perceived  them  to  be  Christians,  con- 
uerted  by  the  Portugall  lesuits."  .  .  .  When  lye- 
yasu  first  took  strong  measures,  they  were  directed, 
not  against  the  Jesuits,  but  against  a  more  imprudent 
order,  —  as  we  know  from  Adams's  correspondence. 
"In  the  yeer  1612,"  he  says,  "is  put  downe  all 
the  sects  of  the  Franciscannes,  The  Jesouets  hau 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  349 

what  priuiledge  .  .  .  theare  beinge  in  Nangasaki,  in 
which  place  only  may  be  so  manny  as  will  of  all 
sectes  :  in  other  places  not  so  many  permitted.  .  .  ." 
Roman  Catholicism  was  given  two  more  years'  grace 
after  the  Franciscan  episode. 

Why  lyeyasu  should  have  termed  it  a  "  false  and 
corrupt  religion,"  both  in  his  Legacy  and  elsewhere, 
remains  to  be  considered.  From  the  Far-Eastern 
point  of  view  he  could  scarcely  have  judged  it  other 
wise,  after  an  impartial  investigation.  It  was  essen 
tially  opposed  to  all  the  beliefs  and  traditions  upon 
which  Japanese  society  had  been  founded.  The 
Japanese  State  was  an  aggregate  of  religious  com 
munities,  with  a  God-King  at  its  head ;  —  the  cus 
toms  of  all  these  communities  had  the  force  of 
religious  laws,  and  ethics  were  identified  with  obedi 
ence  to  custom  ;  filial  piety  was  the  basis  of  social 
order,  and  loyalty  itself  was  derived  from  filial  piety. 
But  this  Western  creed,  which  taught  that  a  husband 
should  leave  his  parents  and  cleave  to  his  wife,  held 
filial  piety  to  be  at  best  an  inferior  virtue.  It  pro 
claimed  that  duty  to  parents,  lords,  and  rulers 
remained  duty  only  when  obedience  involved  no 
action  opposed  to  Roman  teaching,  and  that  the 
supreme  duty  of  obedience  was  not  to  the  Heavenly 
Sovereign  at  Kyoto,  but  to  the  Pope  at  Rome. 
Had  not  the  Gods  and  the  Buddhas  been  called 
devils  by  these  missionaries  from  Portugal  and 
Spain  ?  Assuredly  such  doctrines  were  subversive, 


350  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

no  matter  how  astutely  they  might  be  interpreted 
by  their  apologists.  Besides,  the  worth  of  a  creed 
as  a  social  force  might  be  judged  from  its  fruits. 
This  creed  in  Europe  had  been  a  ceaseless  cause 
of  disorders,  wars,  persecutions,  atrocious  cruelties. 
This  creed,  in  Japan,  had  fomented  great  disturb 
ances,  had  instigated  political  intrigues,  had  wrought 
almost  immeasurable  mischief.  In  the  event  of 
future  political  trouble,  it  would  justify  the  diso 
bedience  of  children  to  parents,  of  wives  to  hus 
bands,  of  subjects  to  lords,  of  lords  to  shogun. 
The  paramount  duty  of  government  was  now  to 
compel  social  order,  and  to  maintain  those  condi 
tions  of  peace  and  security  without  which  the  nation 
could  never  recover  from  the  exhaustion  of  a  thou 
sand  years  of  strife.  But  so  long  as  this  foreign 
religion  was  suffered  to  attack  and  to  sap  the  foun 
dations  of  order,  there  never  could  be  peace.  .  .  . 
Convictions  like  these  must  have  been  well  estab 
lished  in  the  mind  of  lyeyasu  when  he  issued  his 
famous  edict.  The  only  wonder  is  that  he  should 
have  waited  so  long. 

Very  possibly  lyeyasu,  who  never  did  anything 
by  halves,  was  waiting  until  Christianity  should  find 
itself  without  one  Japanese  leader  of  ability.  In 
1611  he  had  information  of  a  Christian  conspiracy 
in  the  island  of  Sado  (a  convict  mining-district)  whose 
governor,  Okubo,  had  been  induced  to  adopt  Chris 
tianity,  and  was  to  be  made  ruler  of  the  country  if 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  351 

the  plot  proved  successful.  But  still  lyeyasu  waited. 
By  1614  Christianity  had  scarcely  even  an  Okubo 
to  lead  the  forlorn  hope.  The  daimyo  converted  in 
the  sixteenth  century  were  dead  or  dispossessed  or 
in  banishment ;  the  great  Christian  generals  had 
been  executed ;  the  few  remaining  converts  of  im 
portance  had  been  placed  under  surveillance,  and 
were  practically  helpless. 

The  foreign  priests  and  native  catechists  were  not 
cruelly  treated  immediately  after  the  proclamation 
of  1614.  Some  three  hundred  of  them  were  put 
into  ships  and  sent  out  of  the  country,  —  together 
with  various  Japanese  suspected  of  religious  political 
intrigues,  such  as  Takayama,  former  daimyo  of 
Akashi,  who  was  called  "  Justo  Ucondono  "  by  the 
Jesuit  writers,  and  who  had  been  dispossessed  and 
degraded  by  Hideyoshi  for  the  same  reasons.  lye 
yasu  set  no  example  of  unnecessary  severity.  But 
harsher  measures  followed  upon  an  event  which 
took  place  in  1615,  —  the  very  year  after  the  issu 
ing  of  the  edict.  Hideyori,  the  son  of  Hideyoshi, 
had  been  supplanted  —  fortunately  for  Japan  —  by 
lyeyasu,  to  whose  tutelage  the  young  man  had 
been  confided.  lyeyasu  took  all  care  of  him,  but 
had  no  intention  of  suffering  him  to  direct  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  country,  —  a  task  scarcely  within  the 
capacity  of  a  lad  of  twenty-three.  In  spite  of  vari 
ous  political  intrigues  in  which  Hideyori  was  known 
to  have  taken  part,  lyeyasu  had  left  him  in  posses- 


352  THE   JESUIT   PERIL 

sion  of  large  revenues,  and  of  the  strongest  fortress  in 
Japan,  —  that  mighty  castle  of  Osaka,  which  Hide- 
yoshi's  genius  had  rendered  almost  impregnable. 
Hideyori,  unlike  his  father,  favoured  the  Jesuits  : 
and  he  made  the  castle  a  refuge  for  adherents  of  the 
"  false  and  corrupt  sect."  Informed  by  government 
spies  of  a  dangerous  intrigue  there  preparing,  lye- 
yasu  resolved  to  strike;  and  he  struck  hard.  In 
spite  of  a  desperate  defence,  the  great  fortress  was 
stormed  and  burnt  —  Hideyori  perishing  in  the  con 
flagration.  One  hundred  thousand  lives  are  said  to 
have  been  lost  in  this  siege.  Adams  wrote  thus 
quaintly  of  Hideyori's  fate,  and  the  results  of  his 
conspiracy :  — 

"  Hee  mad  warres  with  the  Emperour  .  .  .  allso 
by  the  Jessvits  and  Ffriers,  which  mad  belleeue  he 
should  be  fauord  with  mirrackles  and  wounders ; 
but  in  fyne  it  proued  the  contrari.  For  the  ould 
Emperour  against  him  pressentlly  maketh  his  forces 
reddy  by  sea  and  land,  and  compasseth  his  castell 
that  he.  was  in  ;  although  with  loss  of  multitudes  on 
both  sides,  yet  in  the  end  rasseth  the  castell  walles, 
setteth  it  on  fyre,  and  burneth  hym  in  it.  Thus 
ended  the  warres.  Now  the  Emperour  heering  of 
thees  Jessvets  and  friers  being  in  the  castell  with  his 
ennemis,  and  still  from  tym  to  tym  agaynst  hym, 
coumandeth  all  romische  sorte  of  men  to  depart  ovt 
of  his  countri  —  thear  churches  pulld  dooun,  and 
burned.  This  folowed  in  the  ould  Emperour's 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  353 

dales.  Now  this  yeear,  1616,  the  old  Emperour  he 
died.  His  son  raigneth  in  his  place,  and  hee  is 
more  hot  agaynste  the  romish  relligion  then  his 
ffather  wass :  for  he  hath  forbidden  thorough  all 
his  domynions,  on  paine  of  deth,  none  of  his  subjects 
to  be  romish  christiane ;  which  romish  seckt  to  pre 
vent  eueri  wayes  that  he  maye,  he  hath  forbidden  that 
no  stranger  merchant  shall  abid  in  any  of  the  great 
citties."  .  .  . 

The  son  here  referred  to  was  Hidetada,  who,  in 
1617,  issued  an  ordinance  sentencing  to  death  every 
Roman  priest  or  friar  discovered  in  Japan,  —  an 
ordinance  provoked  by  the  fact  that  many  priests 
expelled  from  the  country  had  secretly  returned, 
and  that  others  had  remained  to  carry  on  their 
propaganda  under  various  disguises.  Meanwhile, 
in  every  city,  town,  village,  and  hamlet  throughout 
the  empire,  measures  had  been  taken  for  the 
extirpation  of  Roman  Christianity.  Every  com 
munity  was  made  responsible  for  the  existence  in 
it  of  any  person  belonging  to  the  foreign  creed ; 
and  special  magistrates,  or  inquisitors,  were  ap 
pointed,  called  Kirishitan-bugyo,  to  seek  out  and  pun 
ish  members  of  the  prohibited  religion.1  Christians 

1  It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  none  of  these  edicts  were  directed  against  Prot 
estant  Christianity  :  the  Dutch  were  not  considered  Christians  in  the  sense  of  the 
ordinances,  nor  were  th  -  English.  The  following  extract  from  a  typical  village, 
Kumicbo,  or  code  of  cuu.munal  regulations,  shows  the  responsibility  imposed  upon 
all  communities  regarding  the  presence  in  their  midst  of  Roman  Catholic  convertj 
or  believers  :  — 

"  Every  year,  between  the  first  and  the  third  month,  we  will  renew  our  Sbumon 
2A 


354  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

who  freely  recanted  were  not  punished,  but  only 
kept  under  surveillance :  those  who  refused  to 
recant,  even  after  torture,  were  degraded  to  the 
condition  of  slaves,  or  else  put  to  death.  In  some 
parts  of  the  country,  extraordinary  cruelty  was  prac 
tised,  and  every  form  of  torture  used  to  compel 
recantation.  But  it  is  tolerably  certain  that  the 
more  atrocious  episodes  of  the  persecution  were 
due  to  the  individual  ferocity  of  local  governors 
or  magistrates  —  as  in  the  case  of  Takenaka 
Uneme-no-Kami,  who  was  compelled  by  the  gov 
ernment  to  perform  harakiri  for  abusing  his  powers 
at  Nagasaki,  and  making  persecution  a  means  of 
extorting  money.  Be  that  as  it  may,  the  persecu 
tion  at  last  either  provoked,  or  helped  to  bring 
about  a  Christian  rebellion  in  the  daimiate  of 
Arima,  —  historically  remembered  as  the  Shima- 
bara  Revolt.  In  1636  a  host  of  peasants,  driven 
to  desperation  by  the  tyranny  of  their  lords  — 
the  daimyo  of  Arima  and  the  daimy5  of  Karatsu 
(convert-districts)  —  rose  in  arms,  burnt  all  the 
Japanese  temples  in  their  vicinity,  and  proclaimed 
religious  war.  Their  banner  bore  a  cross ;  their 
leaders  were  converted  samurai.  They  were  soon 

cbo.  If  we  know  of  any  person  who  belongs  to  a  prohibited  sect,  we  will  immedi 
ately  inform  the  Daikiuan.  .  .  .  Servants  and  labourers  shall  give  to  their  masters 
a  certificate  declaring  that  they  are  not  Christians.  In  re^id  to  persons  who  have 
been  Christians,  but  have  recanted,  —  if  such  persons  come  to  or  leave  the  village, 
we  promise  to  report  it." — See  Professor  Wigmore's  Notes  on  Land-Tenure 
and  Local  Institutions  in  Old  Japan. 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  355 

joined  by  Christian  refugees  from  every  part  of  the 
country,  until  their  numbers  swelled  to  thirty  or 
forty  thousand.  On  the  coast  of  the  Shimabara 
peninsula  they  seized  an  abandoned  castle,  at  a 
place  called  Hara,  and  there  fortified  themselves. 
The  local  authorities  could  not  cope  with  the  up 
rising  ;  and  the  rebels  more  than  held  their  own 
until  government  forces,  aggregating  over  160,000 
men,  were  despatched  against  them.  After  a  brave 
defence  of  one  hundred  and  two  days,  the  castle  was 
stormed  in  1638,  and  its  defenders,  together  with 
their  women  and  children,  put  to  the  sword. 
Officially  the  occurrence  was  treated  as  a  peasant 
revolt ;  and  the  persons  considered  responsible  for 
it  were  severely  punished ;  —  the  lord  of  Shi 
mabara  (Arima)  was  further  sentenced  to  perform 
harakiri.  Japanese  historians  state  that  the  rising 
was  first  planned  and  led  by  Christians,  who  de 
signed  to  seize  Nagasaki,  subdue  Kyushu,  invite 
foreign  military  help,  and  compel  a  change  of 
government; — the  Jesuit  writers  would  have  us 
believe  there  was  no  plot.  One  thing  certain  is 
that  a  revolutionary  appeal  was  made  to  the  Chris 
tian  element,  and  was  largely  responded  to  with 
alarming  consequences.  A  strong  castle  on  the 
Kyushu  coast,  held  by  thirty  or  forty  thousand 
Christians,  constituted  a  serious  danger,  —  a  point 
of  vantage  from  which  a  Spanish  invasion  of  the 
country  might  have  been  attempted  with  some 


356  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

chance  of  success.  The  government  seems  to 
have  recognized  this  danger,  and  to  have  despatched 
in  consequence  an  overwhelming  force  to  Shimabara. 
If  foreign  help  could  have  been  sent  to  the  rebels, 
the  result  might  have  been  a  prolonged  civil  war. 
As  for  the  wholesale  slaughter,  it  represented  no 
more  than  the  enforcement  of  Japanese  law :  the 
punishment  of  the  peasant  revolting  against  his 
lord,  under  any  circumstances  whatever,  being 
death.  So  far  as  concerns  the  policy  of  such 
massacre,  it  may  be  remembered  that,  with  less 
provocation,  Nobunaga  exterminated  the  Tendai 
Buddhists  at  Hiyei-san.  We  have  every  reason 
to  pity  the  brave  men  who  perished  at  Shimabara, 
and  to  sympathize  with  their  revolt  against  the 
atrocious  cruelty  of  their  rulers.  But  it  is  neces 
sary,  as  a  simple  matter  of  justice,  to  consider  the 
whole  event  from  the  Japanese  political  point  of 
view. 

The  Dutch  have  been  denounced  for  helping  to 
crush  the  rebellion  with  ships  and  cannon :  they 
fired,  by  their  own  acknowledgment,  426  shot 
into  the  castle.  However,  the  extant  correspond 
ence  of  the  Dutch  factory  at  Hirado  proves  be 
yond  question  that  they  were  forced,  under  menace, 
to  thus  act.  In  any  event,  it  would  be  difficult  to 
discover  a  good  reason  for  the  merely  religious  de 
nunciations  of  their  conduct,  —  although  that  con 
duct  would  be  open  to  criticism  from  the  humane 


THE   JESUIT   PERIL  357 

point  of  view.  Dutchmen  could  not  reasonably 
have  refused  to  assist  the  Japanese  authorities  in 
suppressing  a  revolt,  merely  because  a  large  pro 
portion  of  the  rebels  happened  to  profess  the  re 
ligion  which  had  been  burning  alive  as  heretics  the 
men  and  women  of  the  Netherlands.  Very  pos 
sibly,  not  a  few  persons  of  kin  to  those  very  Dutch 
had  suffered  in  the  days  of  .Alva.  What  would 
have  happened  to  all  the  English  and  Dutch  in 
Japan,  if  the  Portuguese  and  Spanish  clergy  could 
have  got  full  control  of  government,  ought  to  be 
obvious. 

With  the  massacre  of  Shimabara  ends  the  real 
history  of  the  Portuguese  and  Spanish  missions. 
After  that  event,  Christianity  was  slowly,  steadily, 
implacably  stamped  out  of  visible  existence.  It 
had  been  tolerated,  or  half-tolerated,  for  only  sixty- 
five  years  :  the  entire  history  of  its  propagation  and 
destruction  occupies  a  period  of  scarcely  ninety  years. 
People  of  nearly  every  rank,  from  prince  to  pauper, 
suffered  for  it ;  thousands  endured  tortures  for  its 
sake  —  tortures  so  frightful  that  even  three  of  those 
Jesuits  who  sent  multitudes  to  useless  martyrdom 
were  forced  to  deny  their  faith  under  the  infliction ; 1 
—  and  tender  women,  sentenced  to  the  stake,  car- 

1  Francisco  Cassola,  Pedro  Marquez,  and  Giuseppe  Chiara.  Two  of  these  — 
probably  under  compulsion — married  Japanese  women.  For  their  after-history,  see  a 
paper  by  Satow  in  the  Transactions  of  the  Asiatic  Society  of  Jap  an ,  Vol.  VI,  Part  I. 


358  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

ried  their  little  ones  with  them  into  the  fire,  rather 
than  utter  the  words  that  would  have  saved  both 
mother  and  child.  Yet  this  religion,  for  which 
thousands  vainly  died,  had  brought  to  Japan  noth 
ing  but  evil :  disorders,  persecutions,  revolts,  politi 
cal  troubles,  and  war.  Even  those  virtues  of  the 
people  which  had  been  evolved  at  unutterable  cost 
for  the  protection  and  conservation  of  society, — 
their  self-denial,  their  faith,  their  loyalty,  their 
constancy  and  courage,  —  were  by  this  black  creed 
distorted,  diverted,  and  transformed  into  forces 
directed  to  the  destruction  of  that  society.  Could 
that  destruction  have  been  accomplished,  and  a 
new  Roman  Catholic  empire  have  been  founded 
upon  the  ruins,  the  forces  of  that  empire  would 
have  been  used  for  the  further  extension  of  priestly 
tyranny,  the  spread  of  the  Inquisition,  the  perpetual 
Jesuit  warfare  against  freedom  of  conscience  and 
human  progress.  Well  may  we  pity  the  victims  of 
this  pitiless  faith,  and  justly  admire  their  useless 
courage :  yet  who  can  regret  that  their  cause  was 
lost  ?  .  .  .  Viewed  from  another  standpoint  than 
that  of  religious  bias,  and  simply  judged  by  its 
results,  the  Jesuit  effort  to  Christianize  Japan  must 
be  regarded  as  a  crime  against  humanity,  a  labour 
of  devastation,  a  calamity  comparable  only,  —  by 
reason  of  the  misery  and  destruction  which  it 
wrought,  —  to  an  earthquake,  a  tidal-wave,  a 
volcanic  eruption. 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  359 

The  policy  of  isolation,  —  of  shutting  off  Japan 
from  the  rest  of  the  world,  —  as  adopted  by  Hide- 
tada  and  maintained  by  his  successors,  sufficiently 
indicates  the  fear  that  religious  intrigues  had  inspired. 
Not  only  were  all  foreigners,  excepting  the  Dutch 
traders,  expelled  from  the  country  ;  all  half-breed 
children  of  Portuguese  or  Spanish  blood  were  also 
expatriated,  Japanese  families  being  forbidden  to 
adopt  or  conceal  any  of  them,  under  penalties  to  be 
visited  upon  all  the  members  of  the  household  dis 
obeying.  In  1636  two  hundred  and  eighty-seven 
half-breed  children  were  shipped  to  Macao.  It  is 
possible  that  the  capacity  of  half-breed  children  to 
act  as  interpreters  was  particularly  dreaded;  but 
there  can  be  little  doubt  that,  at  the  time  when  this 
ordinance  was  issued,  race-hatred  had  been  fully 
aroused  by  religious  antagonism.  After  the  Shima- 
bara  episode  all  Western  foreigners,  without  exception, 
were  regarded  with  unconcealed  distrust.1  The 
Portuguese  and  Spanish  traders  were  replaced  by 
the  Dutch  (the  English  factory  having  been  closed 
some  years  previously)  ;  but  even  in  the  case  of 
these,  extraordinary  precautions  were  taken.  They 
were  compelled  to  abandon  their  good  quarters  at 
Hirado,  and  transfer  their  factory  to  Deshima,  —  a 
tiny  island  only  six  hundred  feet  long,  by  two  hun 
dred  and  forty  feet  wide.  There  they  were  kept 
under  constant  guard,  like  prisoners  ;  they  were  not 

1  The  Chinese  traders,  however,  were  allowed  much  more  liberty  than  the  Dutch, 


360  THE    JESUIT   PERIL 

permitted  to  go  among  the  people ;  no  man  could 
visit  them  without  permission,  and  no  woman,  except 
a  prostitute,  was  allowed  to  enter  their  reservation 
under  any  circumstances.  But  they  had  a  monopoly 
of  the  trade  of  the  country ;  and  Dutch  patience 
endured  these  conditions,  for  the  profit's  sake,  dur 
ing  more  than  two  hundred  years.  Other  commerce 
with  foreign  countries  than  that  maintained  by  the 
Dutch  factory,  and  by  the  Chinese,  was  entirely  sup 
pressed.  For  any  Japanese  to  leave  Japan  was  a 
capital  offence ;  and  any  one  who  might  succeed  in 
leaving  the  country  by  stealth,  was  to  be  put  to 
death  upon  his  return.  The  purpose  of  this  law 
was  to  prevent  Japanese,  sent  abroad  by  the  Jesuits 
for  missionary  training,  from  returning  to  Japan  in  the 
disguise  of  laymen.  It  was  forbidden  also  to  con 
struct  ships  capable  of  long  voyages ;  and  all  ships 
exceeding  a  dimension  fixed  by  the  government 
were  broken  up.  Lookouts  were  established  along 
the  coast  to  watch  for  strange  vessels ;  and  any 
European  ships  entering  a  Japanese  port,  excepting 
the  ships  of  the  Dutch  company,  were  to  be  attacked 
and  destroyed. 

The  great  success  at  first  achieved  by  the  Portu 
guese  missions  remains  to  be  considered.  In  our 
present  comparative  ignorance  of  Japanese  social 
history,  it  is  not  easy  to  understand  the  whole  of  the 
Christian  episode.  There  are  plenty  of  Jesuit- 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  361 

missionary  records  ;  but  the  Japanese  contemporary 
chronicles  yield  us  scanty  information  about  the  mis 
sions —  probably  for  the  reason  that  an  edict  was 
issued  in  the  seventeenth  century  interdicting,  not 
only  all  books  on  the  subject  of  Christianity,  but 
any  book  containing  the  words  Christian  or  Foreign. 
What  the  Jesuit  books  do  not  explain,  and  what  we 
should  rather  have  expected  Japanese  historians  to  ex 
plain,  had  they  been  allowed,  is  how  a  society  founded 
on  ancestor-worship,  and  apparently  possessing  im 
mense  capacity  for  resistance  to  outward  assault, 
could  have  been  so  quickly  penetrated  and  partly 
dissolved  by  Jesuit  energy.  The  question  of  all 
questions  that  I  should  like  to  see  answered,  by 
Japanese  evidence,  is  this  :  To  what  extent  did  the 
missionaries  interfere  with  the  ancestor-cult  ?  It  is  an 
important  question.  In  China,  the  Jesuits  were  quick 
to  perceive  that  the  power  of  resistance  to  proselytism 
lay  in  ancestor-worship ;  and  they  shrewdly  endeav 
oured  to  tolerate  it,  somewhat  as  Buddhism  before 
them  had  been  obliged  to  do.  Had  the  Papacy 
supported  their  policy,  the  Jesuits  might  have 
changed  the  history  of  China ;  but  other  religious 
orders  fiercely  opposed  the  compromise,  and  the 
chance  was  lost.  How  far  the  ancestor-cult  was  tol 
erated  by  the  Portuguese  missionaries  in  Japan  is  a 
matter  of  much  sociological  interest  for  investigation. 
The  supreme  cult  was,  of  course,  left  alone,  for 
obvious  reasons.  It  is  difficult  to  suppose  that  the 


362  THE    JESUIT    PERIL 

domestic  cult  was  attacked  then  as  implacably  as  it 
is  attacked  now  by  Protestant  and  Roman  Catholic 
missionaries  alike;  —  it  is  difficult  to  suppose,  for 
example,  that  converts  were  compelled  to  cast  away 
or  to  destroy  their  ancestral  tablets.  On  the  other 
hand,  we  are  yet  in  doubt  as  to  whether  many  of 
the  poorer  converts  —  servants  and  other  common 
folk  —  possessed  a  domestic  ancestor-cult.  The  out 
cast  classes,  among  whom  many  converts  were 
made,  need  not  be  considered,  of  course,  in  this 
relation.  Before  the  matter  can  be  fairly  judged, 
much  remains  to  be  learned  about  the  religious  con 
dition  of  the  heimin  during  the  sixteenth  century. 
Anyhow,  whatever  methods  were  followed,  the  early 
success  of  the  missions  was  astonishing.  Their 
work,  owing  to  the  particular  character  of  the  social 
organization,  necessarily  began  from  the  top :  the 
subject  could  change  his  creed  only  by  permission 
of  his  lord.  From  the  outset  this  permission  was 
freely  granted.  In  some  cases  the  people  were  offi 
cially  notified  that  they  were  at  liberty  to  adopt  the 
new  religion  ;  in  other  cases,  converted  lords  ordered 
them  to  do  so.  It  would  seem  that  the  foreign 
faith  was  at  first  mistaken  for  a  new  kind  of  Buddh 
ism  ;  and  in  the  extant  official  grant  of  land  at  Ya- 
maguchi  to  the  Portuguese  mission,  in  1552,  the 
Japanese  text  plainly  states  that  the  grant  (which  ap 
pears  to  have  included  a  temple  called  Daidoji) 
was  made  to  the  strangers  that  they  might  preach 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  363 

"the  Law  of  Buddha"  —  Buppo  shoryo  no  tame. 
The  original  document  is  thus  translated  by  Sir 
Ernest  Satow,  who  reproduced  it  in  facsimile  :  — 

"With  respect  to  Daidoji  in  Yamaguchi  Agata,  Yoshiki 
department,  province  of  Suwo.  This  deed  witnesses  that  I 
have  given  permission  to  the  priests  who  have  come  to  this 
country  from  the  Western  regions,  in  accordance  with 
their  request  and  desire,  that  they  may  found  and  erect  a 
monastery  and  house  in  order  to  develope  the  Law  of 
Buddha. 

"  The  28th  day  of  the  8th  month  of  the  2ist  year  of 
Tembun. 

"Suwo  NO  SUKE. 
"  [August  Seal]  "  * 

If  this  error  [or  deception?]  could  have  occurred 
at  Yamaguchi,  it  is  reasonable  to  suppose  that  it 
also  occurred  in  other  places.  Exteriorly  the  Ro 
man  rites  resembled  those  of  popular  Buddhism: 
the  people  would  have  observed  but  little  that  was 
unfamiliar  to  them  in  the  forms  of  the  service,  the 
vestments,  the  beads,  the  prostrations,  the  images, 
the  bells,  and  the  incense.  The  virgins  and  the  saints 
would  have  been  found  to  resemble  the  aureoled 
Boddhisattvas  and  Buddhas ;  the  angels  and  the  de 
mons  would  have  been  at  once  identified  with  the  Ten- 

1  In  the  Latin  and  Portuguese  translations,  or  rather  pretended  translations  of  this 
document,  there  is  nothing  about  preaching  the  Law  of  Buddha ;  and  there  are 
many  things  added  which  do  not  exist  in  the  Japanese  text  at  all.  See  Transactions 
of  the  Asiatic  Society  of  Japan  (Vol.  VIII,  Part  II)  for  Satow's  comment  on 
this  document  and  the  false  translations  made  of  it. 


364  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

nin  and  the  Oni.  All  that  pleased  popular  imagination 
in  the  Buddhist  ceremonial  could  be  witnessed,  under 
slightly  different  form,  in  those  temples  which 
had  been  handed  over  to  the  Jesuits,  and  con 
secrated  by  them  as  churches  or  chapels.  The 
fathomless  abyss  really  separating  the  two  faiths 
could  not  have  been  perceived  by  the  common 
mind ;  but  the  outward  resemblances  were  imme 
diately  observable.  There  were  furthermore  some 
attractive  novelties.  It  appears,  for  example,  that 
the  Jesuits  used  to  have  miracle-plays  performed  in 
their  churches  for  the  purpose  of  attracting  pop 
ular  attention.  .  .  .  But  outward  attractions  of 
whatever  sort,  or  outward  resemblances  to  Buddhism, 
could  only  assist  the  spread  of  the  new  religion  ; 
they  could  not  explain  the  rapid  progress  of  the 
propaganda. 

Coercion  might  partly  explain  it,  —  coercion  ex 
ercised  by  converted  daimyo  upon  their  subjects. 
Populations  of  provinces  are  known  to  have  fol 
lowed,  under  strong  compulsion,  the  religion  of  their 
converted  lords  ;  and  hundreds  —  perhaps  thousands 
—  of  persons  must  have  done  the  same  thing  through 
mere  habit  of  loyalty.  In  these  cases  it  is  worth 
while  to  consider  what  sort  of  persuasion  was  used 
upon  the  daimyo.  We  know  that  one  gieat  help 
to  the  missionary  work  was  found  in  Portuguese 
commerce,  —  especially  the  trade  in  firearms  and 
ammunition.  In  the  disturbed  state  of  the  country 


THE   JESUIT   PERIL  365 

preceding  the  advent  to  power  of  Hideyoshi,  this 
trade  was  a  powerful  bribe  in  religious  negotiation 
with  provincial  lords.  The  daimyo  able  to  use  fire 
arms  would  necessarily  possess  some  advantage  over 
a  rival  lord  having  no  such  weapons ;  and  those 
lords  able  to  monopolize  the  trade  could  increase 
their  power  at  the  expense  of  their  neighbours.  Now 
this  trade  was  actually  offered  for  the  privilege  of 
preaching ;  and  sometimes  much  more  than  that 
privilege  was  demanded  and  obtained.  In  1572  the 
Portuguese  presumed  to  ask  for  the  whole  town  of 
Nagasaki,  as  a  gift  to  their  church,  —  with  power 
of  jurisdiction  over  the  same ;  threatening,  in  case 
of  refusal,  to  establish  themselves  elsewhere.  The 
daimyo,  Omura,  at  first  demurred,  but  eventually 
yielded  ;  and  Nagasaki  then  became  Christian  terri 
tory,  directly  governed  by  the  Church.  Very  soon 
the  fathers  began  to  prove  the  character  of  their 
creed  by  furious  attacks  upon  the  local  religion. 
They  set  fire  to  the  great  Buddhist  temple,  Jinguji, 
and  attributed  the  fire  to  the  "  wrath  of  God,"  — 
after  which  act,  by  the  zeal  of  their  converts,  some 
eighty  other  temples,  in  or  about  Nagasaki,  were 
burnt.  Within  Nagasaki  territory  Buddhism  was 
totally  suppressed,  —  its  priests  being  persecuted 
and  driven  away.  In  the  province  of  Bungo  the 
Jesuit  persecution  of  Buddhism  was  far  more 
violent,  and  conducted  upon  an  extensive  scale. 
Otomo  Sorin  Munechika,  the  reigning  daimyo,  not 


366  THE   JESUIT   PERIL 

only  destroyed  all  the  Buddhist  temples  in  his  do 
minion  (to  the  number,  it  is  said,  of  three  thousand), 
but  had  many  of  the  Buddhist  priests  put  to  death. 
For  the  destruction  of  the  great  temple  of  Hikozan, 
whose  priests  were  reported  to  have  prayed  for  the 
tyrant's  death,  he  is  said  to  have  maliciously  chosen 
the  sixth  day  of  the  fifth  month  (1576),  —  the 
festival  of  the  Birthday  of  the  Buddha  ! 

Coercion,  exercised  by  their  lords  upon  a  docile 
people  trained  to  implicit  obedience,  would  explain 
something  of  the  initial  success  of  the  missions  ;  but 
it  would  leave  many  other  matters  unexplained : 
the  later  success  of  the  secret  propaganda,  the  fer 
vour  and  courage  of  the  converts  under  persecution, 
the  long-continued  indifference  of  the  chiefs  of  the 
ancestor-cult  to  the  progress  of  the  hostile  faith.  .  .  . 
When  Christianity  first  began  to  spread  through 
the  Roman  empire,  the  ancestral  religion  had  fallen 
into  decay,  the  structure  of  society  had  lost  its  orig 
inal  form,  and  there  was  no  religious  conservatism 
really  capable  of  successful  resistance.  But  in  the 
Japan  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries, 
the  religion  of  the  ancestors  was  very  much  alive ; 
and  society  was  only  entering  upon  the  second 
period  of  its  yet  imperfect  integration.  The  Jesuit 
conversions  were  not  made  among  a  people  already 
losing  their  ancient  faith,  but  in  one  of  the  most 
intensely  religious  and  conservative  societies  that 
ever  existed.  Christianity  of  any  sort  could  not 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  367 

have  been  introduced  into  such  a  society  without 
effecting  structural  disintegrations,  —  disintegrations, 
at  least,  of  a  local  character.  How  far  these  disin 
tegrations  extended  and  penetrated  we  do  not  know  ; 
and  we  have  yet  no  adequate  explanation  of  the 
long  inertia  of  the  native  religious  instinct  in  the 
face  of  danger. 

But  there  are  certain  historical  facts  which  appear 
to  throw  at  least  a  side-light  upon  the  subject.  The 
early  Jesuit  policy  in  China,  as  established  by  Ricci, 
had  been  to  leave  converts  free  to  practise  the  an 
cestral  rites.  So  long  as  this  policy  was  followed, 
the  missions  prospered.  When,  in  consequence  of 
this  compromise,  dissensions  arose,  the  matter  was 
referred  to  Rome.  Pope  Innocent  X  decided  for 
intolerance  by  a  bull  issued  in  1645  >  and  the  Jesuit 
missions  were  thereby  practically  ruined  in  China. 
Pope  Innocent's  decision  was  indeed  reversed  the 
very  next  year  by  a  bull  of  Pope  Alexander  VIII  ; 
but  "gain  and  again  contests  were  raised  by  the 
religious  bodies  over  this  question  of  ancestor- 
worship,  until  in  1693  Pope  Clement  XI  definitively 
prohibited  converts  from  practising  the  ancestral  rites 
under  any  form  whatsoever.  .  .  .  All  the  efforts 
of  all  the  missions  in  the  Far  East  have  ever  since 
then  failed  to  advance  the  cause  of  Christianity. 
The  sociological  reason  is  plain. 

We  have  seen,  then,  that  up  to  the  year  1645 
the  ancestor-cult  had  been  tolerated  by  the  Jesuits 


368  THE   JESUIT   PERIL 

in  China,  with  promising  results ;  and  it  is  probable 
that  an  identical  policy  of  tolerance  was  maintained 
in  Japan  during  the  second  half  of  the  sixteenth 
century.  The  Japanese  missions  began  in  1549, 
and  their  history  ends  with  the  Shimabara  slaughter 
in  #638,  —  about  seven  years  before  the  first  Papal 
decision  against  the  tolerance  of  ancestor-worship. 
The  Jesuit  mission-work  seems  to  have  prospered 
steadily,  in  spite  of  all  opposition,  until  it  was 
interfered  with  by  less  cautious  and  more  uncompro 
mising  zealots.  By  a  bull  issued  in  1585  by  Greg 
ory  XIII,  and  confirmed  in  1600  by  Clement  III, 
the  Jesuits  alone  were  authorized  to  do  missionary- 
work  in  Japan ;  and  it  was  not  until  after  their 
privileges  had  been  ignored  by  Franciscan  zeal  that 
trouble  with  the  government  began.  We  have  seen 
that  in  1593  Hideyoshi  had  six  Franciscans  executed. 
Then  the  issue  of  a  new  Papal  bull  in  1608,  by  Paul 
V,  allowing  Roman  Catholic  missionaries  of  all 
orders  to  work  in  Japan,  probably  ruined  the  Jesuit 
interests.  It  will  be  remembered  that  lyeyasu  sup 
pressed  the  Franciscans  in  1612,  —  a  proof  that 
their  experience  with  Hideyoshi  had  profited  them 
little.  On  the  whole,  it  appears  more  than  likely 
that  both  Dominicans  and  Franciscans  recklessly 
meddled  with  matters  which  the  Jesuits  (whom  they 
accused  of  timidity)  had  been  wise  enough  to  leave 
alone,  and  that  this  interference  hastened  the  inev 
itable  ruin  of  the  missions. 


THE   JESUIT   PERIL  369 

We  may  reasonably  doubt  whether  there  were  a 
million  Christians  in  Japan  at  the  beginning  of  the 
seventeenth  century  :  the  more  probable  claim  of 
six  hundred  thousand  can  be  accepted.  In  this  era 
of  toleration  the  efforts  of  all  the  foreign  missionary 
bodies  combined,  and  the  yearly  expenditure  of 
immense  sums  in  support  of  their  work,  have 
enabled  them  to  achieve  barely  one-fifth  of  the 
success  attributed  to  their  Portuguese  predecessors, 
upon  a  not  incredible  estimate.  The  sixteenth- 
century  Jesuits  were  indeed  able  to  exercise,  through 
various  lords,  the  most  forcible  sort  of  coercion  upon 
whole  populations  of  provinces  ;  but  the  modern  mis 
sions  certainly  enjoy  advantages  educational,  financial, 
and  legislative,  much  outweighing  the  doubtful  value 
of  the  power  to  coerce ;  and  the  smallness  of  the 
results  which  they  have  achieved  seems  to  require 
explanation.  The  explanation  is  not  difficult.  Need 
less  attacks  upon  the  ancestor-cult  are  necessarily  at 
tacks  upon  the  constitution  of  society ;  and  Japanese 
society  instinctively  resists  these  assaults  upon  its 
ethical  basis.  For  it  is  an  error  to  suppose  that  this 
Japanese  society  has  yet  arrived  even  at  such  a  con 
dition  as  Roman  society  presented  in  the  second  or 
third  century  of  our  era.  Rather  it  remains  at  a 
stage  resembling  that  of  a  Greek  or  Latin  society 
many  centuries  before  Christ.  The  introduction  of 
railroads,  telegraphs,  modern  arms  of  precision, 
modern  applied  science  of  all  kinds,  has  not  yet 

2B 


370  THE   JESUIT    PERIL 

sufficed  to  change  the  fundamental  order  of  things. 
Superficial  disintegrations  are  rapidly  proceeding;  new 
structures  are  forming ;  but  the  social  condition  still 
remains  much  like  that  which,  in  southern  Europe, 
long  preceded  the  introduction  of  Christianity. 

Though  every  form  of  religion  holds  something 
of  undying  truth,  the  evolutionist  must  classify  reli 
gions.  He  must  regard  a  monotheistic  faith  as  repre 
senting,  in  the  progress  of  human  thought,  a  very 
considerable  advance  upon  any  polytheistic  creed ; 
monotheism  signifying  the  fusion  and  expansion  of 
countless  ghostly  beliefs  into  one  vast  concept  of 
unseen  omnipotent  power.  And,  from  the  stand 
point  of  psychological  evolution,  he  must  of  course 
consider  pantheism  as  an  advance  upon  monotheism, 
and  must  further  regard  agnosticism  as  an  advance 
upon  both.  But  the  value  of  a  creed  is  necessarily 
relative ;  and  the  question  of  its  worth  is  to  be 
decided,  not  by  its  adaptability  to  the  intellectual 
developments  of  a  single  cultured  class,  but  by  its 
larger  emotional  relation  to  the  whole  society  of 
which  it  embodies  the  moral  experience.  Its  value 
to  any  other  society  must  depend  upon  its  power  of 
self-adaptation  to  the  ethical  experience  of  that 
society.  We  may  grant  that  Roman  Catholicism 
was,  by  sole  virtue  of  its  monotheistic  conception,  a 
stage  in  advance  of  the  primitive  ancestor-worship. 
But  it  was  adapted  only  to  a  form  of  society  at 


THE   JESUIT    PERIL  371 

which  neither  Chinese  nor  Japanese  civilization  had 
arrived,  —  a  form  of  society  in  which  the  ancient 
family  had  been  dissolved,  and  the  religion  of  filial 
piety  forgotten.  Unlike  that  subtler  and  incompara 
bly  more  humane  creed  of  India,  which  had  learned 
the  secret  of  missionary-success  a  thousand  years 
before  Loyola,  the  religion  of  the  Jesuits  could  never 
have  adapted  itself  to  the  social  conditions  of 
Japan ;  and  by  the  fact  of  this  incapacity  the  fate 
of  the  missions  was  really  decided  in  advance.  The 
intolerance,  the  intrigues,  the  savage  persecutions 
carried  on,  —  all  the  treacheries  and  cruelties  of  the 
Jesuits,  —  may  simply  be  considered  as  the  mani 
festations  of  such  incapacity ;  while  the  repressive 
measures  taken  by  lyeyasu  and  his  successors  signify 
sociologically  no  more  than  the  national  perception 
of  supreme  danger.  It  was  recognized  that  the 
triumph  of  the  foreign  religion  would  involve  the 
total  disintegration  of  society,  and  the  subjection  of 
the  empire  to  foreign  domination. 

Neither  the  artist  nor  the  sociologist,  at  least,  can 
regret  the  failure  of  the  missions.  Their  extirpa 
tion,  which  enabled  Japanese  society  to  evolve  to 
its  type-limit,  preserved  for  modern  eyes  the  mar 
vellous  world  of  Japanese  art,  and  the  yet  more 
marvellous  world  of  its  traditions,  beliefs,  and  cus 
toms.  Roman  Catholicism,  triumphant,  would  have' 
swept  all  this  out  of  existence.  The  natural  antago- 


372  THE   JESUIT   PERIL 

nism  of  the  artist  to  the  missionary  may  be  found  in 
the  fact  that  the  latter  is  always,  and  must  be,  an 
unsparing  destroyer.  Everywhere  the  develop 
ments  of  art  are  associated  in  some  sort  with  reli 
gion  ;  and  by  so  much  as  the  art  of  a  people  reflects 
their  beliefs,  that  art  will  be  hateful  to  the  enemies 
of  those  beliefs.  Japanese  art,  of  Buddhist  origin, 
is  especially  an  art  of  religious  suggestion,  —  not 
merely  as  regards  painting  and  sculpture,  but  like 
wise  as  regards  decoration,  and  almost  every  product 
of  aesthetic  taste.  There  is  something  of  religious 
feeling  associated  even  with  the  Japanese  delight  in 
trees  and  flowers,  the  charm  of  gardens,  the  love  of 
nature  and  of  nature's  voices,  —  with  all  the  poetry 
of  existence,  in  short.  Most  assuredly  the  Jesuits 
and  their  allies  would  have  ended  all  this,  every 
detail  of  it,  without  the  slightest  qualm.  Even 
could  they  have  understood  and  felt  the  meaning 
of  that  world  of  strange  beauty,  —  result  of  a  race- 
experience  never  to  be  repeated  or  replaced,  —  they 
would  not  have  hesitated  a  moment  in  the  work  of 
obliteration  and  effacement.  To-day,  indeed,  that 
wonderful  art-world  is  being  surely  and  irretrievably 
destroyed  by  Western  industrialism.  But  industrial 
influence,  though  pitiless,  is  not  fanatic ;  and  the 
destruction  is  not  being  carried  on  with  such  fero 
cious  rapidity  but  that  the  fading  story  of  beauty 
can  be  recorded  for  the  future  benefit  of  human 
civilization. 


Feudal   Integration 


Feudal   Integration 

IT  was  under  the  later  Tokugawa  Shogun — dur 
ing  the  period  immediately  preceding  the  modern 
regime  —  that  Japanese  civilization  reached  the 
limit  of  its  development.  No  further  evolution  was 
possible,  except  through  social  reconstruction.  The 
conditions  of  this  integration  chiefly  represented  the 
reinforcement  and  definition  of  conditions  preexist 
ing, —  scarcely  anything  in  the  way  of  fundamental 
change.  More  than  ever  before  the  old  compul 
sory  systems  of  cooperation  were  strengthened ; 
more  than  ever  before  all  details  of  ceremonial  con 
vention  were  insisted  upon  with  merciless  exactitude. 
In  preceding  ages  there  had  been  more  harshness; 
but  at  no  previous  period  had  there  been  less  lib 
erty.  Nevertheless,  the  results  of  this  increased 
restriction  were  not  without  ethical  value :  the  time 
was  yet  far  off  at  which  personal  liberty  could  prove 
a  personal  advantage ;  and  the  paternal  coercion  of 
the  Tokugawa  rule  helped  to  develop  and  to  accen 
tuate  much  of  what  is  most  attractive  in  the  national 
character.  Centuries  of  warfare  had  previously  allowed 
small  opportunity  for  the  cultivation  of  the  more  deli 
cate  qualities  of  that  character  :  the  refinements,  the 

375 


376  FEUDAL    INTEGRATION 

ingenuous  kindliness,  the  joy  in  life  that  after 
ward  lent  so  rare  a  charm  to  Japanese  existence. 
But  during  two  hundred  years  of  peace,  prosperity, 
and  national  isolation,  the  graceful  and  winning  side 
of  this  human  nature  found  chance  to  bloom ;  and 
the  multiform  restraints  of  law  and  custom  then 
quickened  and  curiously  shaped  the  blossoming, — 
as  the  gardener's  untiring  art  evolves  the  flowers  of 
the  chrysanthemum  into  a  hundred  forms  of  fantastic 
beauty.  .  .  .  Though  the  general  social  tendency 
under  pressure  was  toward  rigidity,  constraint  left 
room,  in  special  directions,  for  moral  and  aesthetic 
cultivation. 

In  order  to  understand  the  social  condition,  it 
will  be  necessary  to  consider  the  nature  of  the 
paternal  rule  in  its  legal  aspects.  To  modern 
imagination  the  old  Japanese  laws  may  well  seem 
intolerable ;  but  their  administration  was  really  less 
uncompromising  than  that  of  our  Western  laws. 
Besides,  although  weighing  heavily  upon  all  classes, 
from  the  highest  to  the  lowest,  the  legal  burden 
was  proportioned  to  the  respective  strength  of  the 
bearers ;  the  application  of  law  being  made  less 
and  less  rigid  as  the  social  scale  descended.  In 
theory  at  least,  from  the  earliest  times,  the  poor 
and  unfortunate  had  been  considered  as  entitled 
to  pity;  and  the  duty  of  showing  them  all  pos 
sible  mercy  was  insisted  upon  in  the  oldest  extant 
moral  code  of  Japan,  —  the  Laws  of  Sh5toku  Tai- 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION  377 

shi.  But  the  most  striking  example  of  such  dis 
crimination  appears  in  the  Legacy  of  lyeyasu, 
which  represents  the  conception  of  justice  in  a 
time  when  society  had  become  much  more  devel 
oped,  its  institutions  more  firmly  fixed,  and  all  its 
bonds  tightened.  This  stern  and  wise  ruler,  who 
declared  that  "  the  people  are  the  foundation  of 
the  Empire,"  commanded  leniency  in  dealing  with 
the  humble.  He  ordained  that  any  lord,  no  mat 
ter  what  his  rank,  convicted  of  breaking  laws  "  to 
the  injury  of  the  people,"  should  be  punished  by 
the  confiscation  of  his  estates.  Perhaps  the  humane 
spirit  of  the  legislator  is  most  strongly  shown  in  his 
enactments  regarding  crime,  as,  for  example,  where 
he  deals  with  the  question  of  adultery  —  necessarily 
a  crime  of  the  first  magnitude  in  any  society  based 
on  ancestor-worship.  By  the  5Oth  article  of  the 
Legacy,  the  injured  husband  is  confirmed  in  his 
ancient  right  to  kill,  —  but  with  this  important 
provision,  that  should  he  kill  but  one  of  the  guilty 
parties,  he  must  himself  be  held  as  guilty  as  either 
of  them.  Should  the  offenders  be  brought  up  for 
trial,  lyeyasu  advises  that,  in  the  case  of  common 
people,  particular  deliberation  be  given  to  the 
matter :  he  remarks  upon  the  weakness  of  human 
nature,  and  suggests  that,  among  the  young  and 
simple-minded,  some  momentary  impulse  of  pas 
sion  may  lead  to  folly  even  when  the  parties  are 
not  naturally  depraved.  But  in  the  next  article. 


378  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

No.  51,  he  orders  that  no  mercy  whatever  be 
shown  to  men  and  women  of  the  upper  classes 
when  convicted  of  the  same  crime.  "  These,"  he 
declares,  "  are  expected  to  know  better  than  to 
occasion  disturbance  by  violating  existing  regula 
tions  ;  and  such  persons,  breaking  the  laws  by 
lewd  trifling  or  illicit  intercourse,  shall  at  once  be 
punished  without  deliberation  or  consultation.1  It 
is  not  the  same  in  this  case  as  in  the  case  of 
farmers,  artizans,  and  traders."  .  .  .  Throughout 
the  entire  code,  this  tendency  to  tighten  the  bonds 
of  law  in  the  case  of  the  military  classes,  and  to 
loosen  them  mercifully  for  the  lower  classes,  is 
equally  visible.  lyeyasu  strongly  disapproved  of 
unnecessary  punishments ;  and  held  that  the  fre 
quency  of  punishments  was  proof,  not  of  the  ill- 
conduct  of  subjects,  but  of  the  ill-conduct  of  officials. 
The  9ist  article  of  his  code  puts  the  matter  thus 
plainly,  even  as  regarded  the  Shogunate :  "  When 
punishments  and  executions  abound  in  the  Empire, 
it  is  a  proof  that  the  military  ruler  is  without  virtue 
and  degenerate."  .  .  .  He  devised  particular  en 
actments  to  protect  the  peasantry  and  the  poor  from 
the  cruelty  or  the  rapacity  of  powerful  lords.  The 
great  daimyo  were  strictly  forbidden,  when  making 
their  obligatory  journeys  to  Yedo,  "  to  disturb  or 
harass  the  people  at  the  post-houses,"  or  suffer 
themselves  "  to  be  puffed  up  with  military  pride/' 

1  That  is  to  say,  immediately  put  to  death. 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION  379 

The  private,  not  less  than  the  public  conduct  of 
these  great  lords,  was  under  Government  surveil 
lance  ;  and  they  were  actually  liable  to  punishment 
for  immorality !  Concerning  debauchery  among 
them,  the  legislator  remarked  that  "  even  though 
this  can  hardly  be  pronounced  insubordination,'* 
it  should  be  judged  and  punished  according  to  the 
degree  in  which  it  constitutes  a  bad  example  for  the 
lower  classes  (Art.  88).1  As  to  veritable  insubordi 
nation  there  was  no  pardon  :  the  severity  of  the  law 
on  this  subject  allowed  of  no  exception  or  mitiga 
tion.  The  53d  section  of  the  Legacy  proves  this 
to  have  been  regarded  as  the  supreme  crime : 
"  The  guilt  of  a  vassal  murdering  his  suzerain  is 
in  principle  the  same  as  that  of  an  arch-traitor  to 
the  Emperor.  His  immediate  companions,  his 
relations,  —  all  even  to  his  most  distant  con 
nexions,  —  shall  be  cut  off,  hewn  to  atoms,  root 
and  fibre.  The  guilt  of  a  vassal  only  lifting  his 
hand  against  his  master,  even  though  he  does  not 

1  Though  even  daimyo  were  liable  to  suffer  for  debauchery,  lyeyasu  did  not 
believe  in  the  expediency  of  attempting  to  suppress  all  vice  by  law.  There  is  a 
strangely  modern  ring  in  his  remarks  upon  this  subject,  in  the  73d  section  of  the 
Legacy  :  "  Virtuous  men  have  said,  both  in  poetry  and  in  classic  works,  that 
houses  of  debauch,  for  women  of  pleasure  and  for  street- walkers,  are  the  worm- 
eaten  spots  of  cities  and  towns.  But  these  are  necessary  evils,  and  if  they  be 
forcibly  abolished,  men  of  unrighteous  principles  will  become  like  ravelled  thread, 
and  there  will  be  no  end  to  daily  pur'shments  ar.d  floggings. "  In  many  castle- 
towns,  however,  such  houses  were  never  allowed  —  probably  in  view  of  the  large 
military  force,  assembled  in  such  towns,  which  had  to  be  maintained  under  iron 
discipline. 


380  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

assassinate  him,  is  the  same/'  In  strong  contrast 
to  this  grim  ordinance  is  the  spirit  of  all  the  regu 
lations  touching  the  administration  of  law  among 
the  lower  classes.  Forgery,  incendiarism,  and  poi 
soning  were  indeed  crimes  justifying  the  penalty  of 
burning  or  crucifixion ;  but  judges  were  instructed 
to  act  with  as  much  leniency  as  circumstances  per 
mitted  in  the  case  of  ordinary  offences.  "  With 
regard  to  minute  details  affecting  individuals  of 
the  inferior  classes,"  says  the  73  d  article  of  the 
code,  "  learn  the  wide  benevolence  of  Koso  of 
the  Han  [Chinese]  dynasty."  It  was  further  or 
dered  that  magistrates  of  the  criminal  and  civil 
courts  should  be  chosen  only  from  "a  class  of 
men  who  are  upright  and  pure,  distinguished  for 
charity  and  benevolence."  All  magistrates  were 
kept  under  close  supervision,  and  their  conduct 
regularly  reported  by  government  spies. 

Another  humane  aspect  of  Tokugawa  legislation 
is  furnished  by  its  dictates  in  regard  to  the  relations 
of  the  sexes.  Although  concubinage  was  tolerated 
in  the  Samurai  class,  for  reasons  relating  to  the  con 
tinuance  of  the  family-cult,  lyeyasu  denounces  the 
indulgence  of  the  privilege  for  merely  selfish  rea 
sons  :  "  Silly  and  ignorant  men  neglect  their  true 
wives  for  the  sake  of  a  loved  mistress,  and  thus  dis 
turb  the  most  important  relation.  .  .  .  Men  so  far 
sunk  as  this  may  always  be  known  as  Samurai  without 
fidelity  or  sincerity."  Celibacy,  condemned  by  pub- 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION  381 

lie  opinion, — except  i  n  the  case  of  Buddhist  priests,  — 
was  equally  condemned  by  the  code.  "One  should 
not  live  alone  after  sixteen  years  of  age,"  declares  the 
legislator ;  "  all  mankind  recognize  marriage  as  the 
first  law  of  nature.'*  The  childless  man  was  obliged 
to  adopt  a  son ;  and  the  47th  article  of  the  Legacy 
ordained  that  the  family  estate  of  a  person  dying 
without  male  issue,  and  without  having  adopted  a 
son,  should  be  "  forfeited  without  any  regard  to 
his  relatives  or  connexions."  This  law,  of  course, 
was  made  in  support  of  the  ancestor-cult,  the  con 
tinuance  of  which  it  was  deemed  the  paramount  duty 
of  each  man  to  provide  for ;  but  the  government 
regulations  concerning  adoption  enabled  everybody 
to  fulfil  the  legal  requirement  without  difficulty. 

Considering  that  this  code  which  inculcated  hu 
manity,  repressed  moral  laxity,  prohibited  celibacy, 
and  rigorously  maintained  the  family-cult,  was  drawn 
up  in  the  time  of  the  extirpation  of  the  Jesuit  mis 
sions,  the  position  assumed  in  regard  to  religious 
freedom  appears  to  us  one  of  singular  liberality. 
"High  and  low  alike,"  proclaims  the  Jist  article, 
"  may  follow  their  own  inclinations  with  respect  to 
religious  tenets  which  have  obtained  down  to  the 
present  time,  except  as  regards  the  false  and  corrupt 
school  \Roman  Catholicism^ .  Religious  disputes  have 
ever  proved  the  bane  and  misfortune  of  this  Empire, 
and  must  be  firmly  suppressed."  .  .  .  But  the 
seeming  liberality  of  this  article  must  not  be  mis- 


382  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

interpreted :  the  legislator  who  made  so  rigid  an 
enactment  in  regard  to  the  religion  of  the  famil) 
was  not  the  man  to  proclaim  that  any  Japanese 
was  free  to  abandon  the  faith  of  his  race  for  an 
alien  creed.  One  must  carefully  read  the  entire 
Legacy  in  order  to  understand  lyeyasu's  real  posi 
tion, —  which  was  simply  this:  that  any  man  was 
free  to  adopt  any  religion  tolerated  by  the  State, 
in  addition  to  his  ancestor-cult.  lyeyasu  was  himself 
a  member  of  the  Jodo  sect  of  Buddhism,  and  a 
friend  of  Buddhism  in  general.  But  he  was  first 
of  all  a  Shintdist ;  and  the  third  article  of  his  code 
commands  devotion  to  the  Kami  as  the  first  of 
duties :  — "  Keep  your  heart  pure ;  and  so  long 
as  your  body  shall  exist,  be  diligent  in  paying 
honour  and  veneration  to  the  Gods."  That  he 
placed  the  ancient  cult  above  Buddhism  should  be 
evident  from  the  text  of  the  £2d  article  of  the 
Legacy,  in  which  he  declares  that  no  one  should 
suffer  himself  to  neglect  the  national  faith  because 
of  a  belief  in  any  other  form  of  religion.  This  text 
is  of  particular  interest :  — 

"  My  body,  and  the  bodies  of  others,  being  born  in  the 
Empire  of  the  Gods,  to  accept  unreservedly  the  teachings 
of  other  countries,  —  such  as  Confucian,  Buddhist,  or 
Taoi'st  doctrines,  —  and  to  apply  one's  whole  and  un 
divided  attention  to  them,  would  be,  in  short,  to  desert 
one's  own  master,  and  transfer  one's  loyalty  to  another. 
Is  not  this  to  forget  the  origin  of  one's  being  ?  " 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION  383 

Of  course  the  Shogun,  professing  to  derive  his 
authority  from  the  descendant  of  the  elder  gods, 
could  not  with  consistency  have  proclaimed  the 
right  of  freedom  to  doubt  those  gods :  his  official 
religious  duty  permitted  of  no  compromise.  But 
the  interest  attaching  to  his  opinions,  as  expressed 
in  the  Legacy,  rests  upon  the  fact  that  the  Legacy 
was  not  a  public,  but  a  strictly  private  document, 
intended  for  the  perusal  and  guidance  of  his  succes 
sors  only.  Altogether  his  religious  position  was 
much  like  that  of  the  liberal  Japanese  statesman  of 
to-day,  —  respect  for  whatever  is  good  in  Buddhism, 
qualified  by  the  patriotic  conviction  that  the  first 
religious  duty  is  to  the  cult  of  the  ancestors,  the 
ancient  creed  of  the  race.  .  .  .  lyeyasu  had  pref 
erences  regarding  Buddhism ;  but  even  in  this  he 
showed  no  narrowness.  Though  he  wrote  in  his 
Legacy,  "  Let  my  posterity  ever  be  of  the  honoured 
sect  of  Jodo,"  he  greatly  reverenced  the  high-priest 
of  the  Tendai  temple,  Yeizan,  who  had  been  one  of 
his  instructors,  and  obtained  for  him  the  highest 
court-office  possible  for  a  Buddhist  priest  to  obtain, 
as  well  as  the  headship  of  the  Tendai  sect.  More 
over  the  Shogun  visited  Yeizan  to  make  there 
official  prayer  for  the  prosperity  of  the  country. 

There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  within  the 
territories  of  the  Shogunate  proper,  comprising  the 
greater  part  of  the  Empire,  the  administration  of 


384  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

ordinary  criminal  law  was  humane,  and  that  the 
infliction  of  punishment  was  made,  in  the  case  of 
the  common  people,  to  depend  largely  upon  circum 
stances.  Needless  severity  was  a  crime  before  the 
higher  military  law,  which,  in  such  cases,  made  no 
distinctions  of  rank.  Although  the  ring-leaders  of 
a  peasant-revolt,  for  example,  would  be  sentenced 
to  death,  the  lord  through  whose  oppression  the 
uprising  was  provoked,  would  be  deprived  of  a  part 
or  the  whole  of  his  estates,  or  degraded  in  rank,  or 
perhaps  even  sentenced  to  perform  harakiri.  Pro 
fessor  Wigmore,  whose  studies  of  Japanese  law  first 
shed  light  upon  the  subject,  has  given  us  an  excel 
lent  review  of  the  spirit  of  the  ancient  legal  meth 
ods.  He  points  out  that  the  administration  of  law 
was  never  made  impersonal  in  the  modern  sense; 
that  unbending  law  did  not,  for  the  people  at  least, 
exist  in  relation  to  minor  offences.  The  Anglo- 
Saxon  idea  of  inflexible  law  is  the  idea  of  a  justice 
impartial  and  pitiless  as  fire :  whoever  breaks  the 
law  must  suffer  the  consequence,  just  as  surely  as 
the  person  who  puts  his  hand  into  fire  must  ex 
perience  pain.  But  in  the  administration  of  the  old 
Japanese  law,  everything  was  taken  into  considera 
tion  :  the  condition  of  the  offender,  his  intelligence, 
his  degree  of  education,  his  previous  conduct,  his 
motives,  suffering  endured,  provocation  received, 
and  so  forth ;  and  final  judgment  was  decided  by 
moral  common  sense  rather  than  by  legal  enactment 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

or  precedent.  Friends  and  relatives  were  allowed 
to  make  plea  for  the  offender,  and  to  help  him  in 
whatever  honest  way  they  could.  If  a  man  were 
falsely  accused,  and  proved  innocent  upon  trial,  he 
would  not  only  be  consoled  by  kind  words,  but 
would  probably  receive  substantial  compensation  ; 
and  it  appears  that  judges  were  accustomed-  rt  the 
end  of  important  trials,  to  reward  good  conduct  as 
well  as  to  punish  crime.1  .  .  .  On  the  other  hand, 
litigation  was  officially  discouraged.  Everything  pos 
sible  was  done  to  prevent  any  cases  from  being  taken 
into  court,  which  could  be  settled  or  compromised  by 
communal  arbitration ;  and  the  people  were  taught 
to  consider  the  court  only  as  the  last  possible 
resort. 

The  general  character  of  the  Tokugawa  rule  can 
be  to  some  degree  inferred  from  the  foregoing  facts. 
It  was  in  no  sense  a  reign  of  terror  that  compelled 
peace  and  encouraged  industry  for  two  hundred  and 

1  The  following  extracts  from  a  sentence  said  to  have  been  passed  by  the  famous 
i^dge,  Ooka  Tadasuk6,  at  the  close  of  a  celebrated  criminal  trial,  are  illustrative: 
"Musashiya  Chobei  and  Goto  Hanshiro,  these  actions  of  yours  are  worthy  of 
the  highest  praise:  as  a  remuneration  I  award  ten  silver  ryb  to  each  of  you.  .  .  . 
Tami,  you,  for  maintaining  your  brother,  are  to  be  commended:  for  this  you  are  to 
receive  the  amount  of  five  kivammon.  Ko,  daughter  of  Chohachi,  you  are  obedient 
to  your  parents:  in  consideration  of  this,  the  sum  of  five  silver  ryo  is  awarded  to 
you."  —  (See  Dening's  Japan  in  Days  of  Tore.}  The  good  old  custom  of  re 
warding  notable  cases  of  filial  piety,  courage,  generosity,  etc.,  though  not  now 
practised  in  the  courts,  is  still  maintained  by  the  local  governments.  The  rewards 
are  small ;  but  the  public  honour  which  they  confer  upon  the  recipient  is  very  great. 
2C 


386  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

fifty  years.  Though  the  national  civilization  was 
restrained,  pruned,  clipped  in  a  thousand  ways,  it 
was  at  the  same  time  cultivated,  refined,  and  strength 
ened.  The  long  peace  established  throughout  the 
Empire  what  had  never  before  existed,  —  a  universal 
feeling  of  security.  The  individual  was  bound  more 
than  -/vzr  by  law  and  custom;  but  he  was  also  pro 
tected  :  he  could  move  without  anxiety  to  the 
length  of  his  chains.  Though  coerced  by  his 
fellows,  they  helped  him  to  bear  the  coercion  cheer 
fully  :  everybody  aided  everybody  else  to  fulfil  the 
obligations  and  to  support  the  burdens  of  communal 
life.  Conditions  tended,  therefore,  toward  the  gen 
eral  happiness  as  well  as  toward  the  general  pros 
perity.  There  was  not,  in  those  years,  any  struggle 
for  existence,  —  not  at  least  in  our  modern  meaning 
of  the  phrase.  The  requirements  of  life  were  easily 
satisfied  ;  every  man  had  a  master  to  provide  for 
him  or  to  protect  him ;  competition  was  repressed 
or  discouraged ;  there  was  no  need  for  supreme 
effort  of  any  sort,  —  no  need  for  the  straining  of  any 
faculty.  Moreover,  there  was  little  or  nothing  to 
strive  after  :  for  the  vast  majority  of  the  people, 
there  were  no  prizes  to  win.  Ranks  and  incomes 
were  fixed  ;  occupations  were  hereditary ;  and  the 
desire  to  accumulate  wealth  must  have  been  checked 
or  numbed  by  those  regulations  which  limited  the 
rich  man's  right  to  use  his  money  as  he  might  please. 
Even  a  great  lord  —  even  the  Shogun  himself — • 


FEUDAL    INTEGRATION  387 

could  not  do  what  he  pleased.  As  for  any  common 
person,  —  farmer,  craftsman,  or  shopkeeper,  —  he 
could  not  build  a  house  as  he  liked,  or  furnish  it 
as  he  liked,  or  procure  for  himself  such  articles  of 
luxury  as  his  taste  might  incline  him  to  buy.  The 
richest  heimin,  who  attempted  to  indulge  himself  in 
any  of  these  ways,  would  at  once  have  been  forcibly 
reminded  that  he  must  not  attempt  to  imitate  the 
habits,  or  to  assume  the  privileges,  of  his  betters. 
He  could  not  even  order  certain  kinds  of  things  to 
be  made  for  him.  The  artizans  or  artists  who 
created  objects  of  luxury,  to  gratify  aesthetic  taste, 
were  little  disposed  to  accept  commissions  from 
people  of  low  rank  :  they  worked  for  princes,  or 
great  lords,  and  could  scarcely  afford  to  take  the 
risk  of  displeasing  their  patrons.  Every  man's 
pleasures  were  more  or  less  regulated  by  his  place 
in  society,  and  to  pass  from  a  lower  into  a  higher 
rank  was  no  easy  matter.  Extraordinary  men  were 
sometimes  able  to  do  this,  by  attracting  the  favour 
of  the  great.  But  many  perils  attended  upon  such 
distinction ;  and  the  wisest  policy  for  the  heimin  was 
to  remain  satisfied  with  his  position,  and  try  to  find 
as  much  happiness  in  life  as  the  law  allowed. 

Personal  ambition  being  thus  restrained,  and  the 
cost  of  existence  reduced  to  a  minimum  much  below 
our  Western  ideas  of  the  necessary,  there  were  really 
established  conditions  highly  favourable  to  certain 
forms  of  culture,  in  despite  of  sumptuary  regula- 


388  FEUDAL    INTEGRATION 

tions.  The  national  mind  was  obliged  to  seek 
solace  for  the  monotony  of  existence,  either  in 
amusement  or  study.  Tokugawa  policy  had  left 
imagination  partly  free  in  the  directions  of  literature 
and  art — the  cheaper  art;  and  within  those  two 
directions  repressed  personality  found  means  to 
utter  itself,  and  fancy  became  creative.  There  was 
a  certain  amount  of  danger  attendant  upon  even 
such  intellectual  indulgences ;  and  much  was  dared. 
Esthetic  taste,  however,  mostly  followed  the  line 
of  least  resistance.  Observation  concentrated  itself 
upon  the  interest  of  everyday  life,  —  upon  incidents 
which  might  be  watched  from  a  window,  or  studied 
in  a  garden,  —  upon  familiar  aspects  of  nature  in 
various  seasons,  —  upon  trees,  flowers,  birds,  fishes, 
or  reptiles,  —  upon  insects  and  the  ways  of  them, — 
upon  all  kinds  of  small  details,  delicate  trifles,  amus 
ing  curiosities.  Then  it  was  that  the  race-genius 
produced  most  of  that  queer  bric-a-brac  which  still 
forms  the  delight  of  Western  collectors.  The  painter, 
the  ivory-carver,  the  decorator,  were  left  almost  un 
troubled  in  their  production  of  fairy-pictures,  exqui 
site  grotesqueries,  miracles  of  liliputian  art  in  metal 
and  enamel  and  lacquer-of-gold.  In  all  such  small 
matters  they  could  feel  free ;  and  the  results  of  that 
freedom  are  now  treasured  in  the  museums  of  Europe 
and  America.  It  is  true  that  most  of  the  arts  (nearly 
all  of  Chinese  origin)  were  considerably  developed 
before  the  Tokugawa  era ;  but  it  was  then  that  they 


FEUDAL    INTEGRATION  389 

began  to  assume  those  inexpensive  forms  which 
placed  aesthetic  gratification  within  reach  of  the 
common  people.  Sumptuary  legislation  or  rule 
might  yet  apply  to  the  use  and  possession  of  costly 
production,  but  not  to  the  enjoyment  of  form  ;  and 
the  beautiful,  whether  shaped  in  paper  or  in  ivory, 
in  clay  or  gold,  is  always  a  power  for  culture.  It 
has  been  said  that  in  a  Greek  city  of  the  fourth  cen 
tury  before  Christ,  every  household  utensil,  even 
the  most  trifling  object,  was  in  respect  of  design  an 
object  of  art ;  and  the  same  fact  is  true,  though  in 
another  and  a  stranger  way,  of  all  things  in  a  Japan 
ese  home :  even  such  articles  of  common  use  as  a 
bronze  candlestick,  a  brass  lamp,  an  iron  kettle,  a 
paper  lantern,  a  bamboo  curtain,  a  wooden  pillow, 
a  wooden  tray,  will  reveal  to  educated  eyes  a  sense 
of  beauty  and  fitness  entirely  unknown  to  Western 
cheap  production.  And  it  was  especially  during 
the  Tokugawa  period  that  this  sense  of  beauty 
began  to  inform  everything  in  common  life.  Then 
also  was  developed  the  art  of  illustration;  then  came 
into  existence  those  wonderful  colour-prints  (the 
most  beautiful  made  in  any  age  or  country)  which 
are  now  so  eagerly  collected  by  wealthy  dilettanti. 
Literature  also  ceased,  like  art,  to  be  the  enjoyment 
of  the  upper  classes  only  :  it  developed  a  multitude 
of  popular  forms.  This  was  the  age  of  popular  fic 
tion,  of  cheap  books,  of  popular  drama,  of  story 
telling  for  young  and  old.  .  .  .  We  may  certainly 


390  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

call  the  Tokugawa  period  the  happiest  in  the  long 
life  of  the  nation.  The  mere  increase  of  population 
and  of  wealth  would  prove  the  fact,  irrespective  of 
the  general  interest  awakened  in  matters  literary  and 
aesthetic.  It  was  an  age  of  popular  enjoyment,  also 
of  general  culture  and  social  refinement. 

Customs  spread  downward  from  the  top  of  society. 
During  the  Tokugawa  period,  various  diversions 
or  accomplishments,  formerly  fashionable  in  upper 
circles  only,  became  common  property.  Three  of 
these  were  of  a  sort  indicating  a  high  degree  of 
refinement :  poetical  contests,  tea-ceremonies,  and 
the  complex  art  of  flower-arrangement.  All  were 
introduced  into  Japanese  society  long  before  the 
Tokugawa  regime ;  —  the  fashion  of  poetical  compe 
titions  must  be  as  old  as  Japanese  authentic  history. 
But  it  was  under  the  Tokugawa  Shogunate  that  such 
amusements  and  accomplishments  became  national. 
Then  the  tea-ceremonies  were  made  a  feature  of 
female  education  throughout  the  country.  Their 
elaborate  character  could  be  explained  only  by  the 
help  of  many  pictures ;  and  it  requires  years  of  train 
ing  and  practice  to  graduate  in  the  art  of  them.  Yet 
the  whole  of  this  art,  as  to  detail,  signifies  no  more 
than  the  making  and  serving  of  a  cup  of  tea.  How 
ever,  it  is  a  real  art  —  a  most  exquisite  art.  The 
actual  making  of  the  infusion  is  a  matter  of  no  con 
sequence  in  itself:  the  supremely  important  matter 
is  that  the  act  be  performed  in  the  most  perfect, 


FEUDAL    INTEGRATION  391 

most  polite,  most  graceful,  most  charming  manner 
possible.  Everything  done  — from  the  kindling  of 
the  charcoal  fire  to  the  presentation  of  the  tea  — 
must  be  done  according  to  rules  of  supreme  eti 
quette  :  rules  requiring  natural  grace  as  well  as  great 
patience  to  fully  master.  Therefore  a  training  in 
the  tea-ceremonies  is  still  held  to  be  a  training  in 
politeness,  in  self-control,  in  delicacy,  —  a  discipline 
in  deportment.  .  .  .  Quite  as  elaborate  is  the  art  of 
arranging  flowers.  There  are  many  different  schools ; 
but  the  object  of  each  system  is  simply  to  display 
sprays  of  leaves  and  flowers  in  the  most  beautiful 
manner  possible,  and  according  to  the  irregular 
graces  of  Nature  herself.  This  art  also  requires 
years  to  learn ;  and  the  teaching  of  it  has  a  moral  as 
well  as  an  aesthetic  value. 

It  was  in  this  period  also  that  etiquette  was  culti 
vated  to  its  uttermost,  —  that  politeness  became  dif 
fused  throughout  all  ranks,  not  merely  as  a  fashion, 
but  as  an  art.  In  all  civilized  societies  of  the  mili 
tant  type  politeness  becomes  a  national  characteristic 
at  an  early  period  ;  and  it  must  have  been  a  common 
obligation  among  the  Japanese,  as  their  archaic 
tongue  bears  witness,  before  the  historical  epoch. 
Public  enactments  on  the  subject  were  made  as  early 
as  the  seventh  century  by  the  founder  of  Japan 
ese  Buddhism,  the  prince-regent,  Shotoku  Taishi. 
"  Ministers  and  functionaries,"  he  proclaimed, 


392  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

<c  should  make  decorous  behaviour1  their  leading  prin 
ciple  ;  for  their  leading  principle  of  the  government 
of  the  people  consists  in  decorous  behaviour.  If  the 
superiors  do  not  behave  with  decorum,  the  inferiors 
are  disorderly  :  if  inferiors  are  wanting  in  proper  be 
haviour,  there  must  necessarily  be  offences.  There 
fore  it  is  that  when  lord  and  vassal  behave  with 
propriety,  the  distinctions  of  rank  are  not  confused : 
when  the  people  behave  with  propriety,  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  Commonwealth  proceeds  of  itself." 
Something  of  the  same  old  Chinese  teaching  we  find 
reechoed,  a  thousand  years  later,  in  the  Legacy  of 
lyeyasu :  "  The  art  of  governing  a  country  consists 
in  the  manifestation  of  due  deference  on  the  part  of 
a  suzerain  to  his  vassals.  Know  that  if  you  turn 
your  back  upon  this,  you  will  be  assassinated ;  and 
the  Empire  will  be  lost."  We  have  already  seen 
that  etiquette  was  rigidly  enforced  upon  all  classes 
by  the  military  rule :  for  at  least  ten  centuries 
before  lyeyasu,  the  nation  had  been  disciplined  in 
politeness,  under  the  edge  of  the  sword.  But  under 
the  Tokugawa  Shogunate  politeness  became  partic 
ularly  a  popular  characteristic, — a  rule  of  conduct 
maintained  by  even  the  lowest  classes  in  their  daily 
relations.  Among  the  higher  classes  it  became  the 
art  of  beauty  in  life.  All  the  taste,  the  grace,  the 

1  Or,  "ceremony":  the  Chinese  term  used  signifying  everything  relating  to 
gentlemanly  and  upright  conduct.  The  translation  is  Mr.  Aston's  (see  Vol.  II, 
p.  130,  of  his  translation  of  the  Nibongi). 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION  393 

nicety  which  then  informed  artistic  production  in 
precious  material,  equally  informed  every  detail  of 
speech  and  action.  Courtesy  was  a  moral  and 
aesthetic  study,  carried  to  such  incomparable  perfec 
tion  that  every  trace  of  the  artificial  disappeared. 
Grace  and  charm  seemed  to  have  become  habit, — 
inherent  qualities  of  the  human  fibre,  —  and  doubt 
less,  in  the  case  of  one  sex  at  least,  did  so  become. 
For  it  has  well  been  said  that  the  most  wonderful 
aesthetic  products  of  Japan  are  not  its  ivories,  nor  its 
bronzes,  nor  its  porcelains,  nor  its  swords,  nor  any 
of  its  marvels  in  metal  or  lacquer  —  but  its  women. 
Accepting  as  partly  true  the  statement  that  woman 
everywhere  is  what  man  has  made  her,  we  might  say 
that  this  statement  is  more  true  of  the  Japanese 
woman  than  of  any  other.  Of  course  it  required 
thousands  and  thousands  of  years  to  make  her ;  but 
the  period  of  which  I  am  speaking  beheld  the  work 
completed  and  perfected.  Before  this  ethical  crea 
tion,  criticism  should  hold  its  breath ;  for  there  is 
here  no  single  fault  save  the  fault  of  a  moral  charm 
unsuited  to  any  world  of  selfishness  and  struggle. 
It  is  the  moral  artist  that  now  commands  our  praise, 
—  the  realizer  of  an  ideal  beyond  Occidental  reach. 
How  frequently  has  it  been  asserted  that,  as  a  moral 
being,  the  Japanese  woman  does  not  seem  to  belong 
to  the  same  race  as  the  Japanese  man  !  Considering 
that  heredity  is  limited  by  sex,  there  is  reason  in  the 
assertion :  the  Japanese  woman  is  an  ethically  differ- 


394  FEUDAL    INTEGRATION 

ent  being  from  the  Japanese  man.  Perhaps  no  such 
type  of  woman  will  appear  again  in  this  world  for  a 
hundred  thousand  years  :  the  conditions  of  indus 
trial  civilization  will  not  admit  of  her  existence. 
The  type  could  not  have  been  created  in  any  society 
shaped  on  modern  lines,  nor  in  any  society  where 
the  competitive  struggle  takes  those  unmoral  forms 
with  which  we  have  become  too  familiar.  Only  a 
society  under  extraordinary  regulation  and  regimen 
tation, —  a  society  in  which  all  self-assertion  was 
repressed,  and  self-sacrifice  made  a  universal  obliga 
tion, —  a  society  in  which  personality  was  clipped 
like  a  hedge,  permitted  to  bud  and  bloom  from 
within,  never  from  without,  —  in  short,  only  a  society 
founded  upon  ancestor-worship,  could  have  produced 
it.  It  has  no  more  in  common  with  the  humanity 
of  this  twentieth  century  of  ours  —  perhaps  very 
much  less  —  than  has  the  life  depicted  upon  old 
Greek  vases.  Its  charm  is  the  charm  of  a  vanished 
world  —  a  charm  strange,  alluring,  indescribable  as 
the  perfume  of  some  flower  of  which  the  species 
became  extinct  in  our  Occident  before  the  modern 
languages  were  born.  Transplanted  successfully  it 
cannot  be :  under  a  foreign  sun  its  forms  revert  to 
something  altogether  different,  its  colours  fade,  its 
perfume  passes  away.  The  Japanese  woman  can 
be  known  only  in  her  own  country,  —  the  Japanese 
woman  as  prepared  and  perfected  by  the  old-time 
education  for  that  strange  society  in  which  the  charm 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION  395 

of  her  moral  being,  —  her  delicacy,  her  supreme  un 
selfishness,  her  child-like  piety  and  trust,  her  exquisite 
tactful  perception  of  all  ways  and  means  to  make  happi 
ness  about  her, —  can  be  comprehended  and  valued. 
I  have  spoken  only  of  her  moral  charm  :  it  re 
quires  time  for  the  unaccustomed  foreign  eye  to 
discern  the  physical  charm.  Beauty,  according  to 
our  Western  standards,  can  scarcely  be  said  to  exist 
in  this  race,  —  or,  shall  we  say  that  it  has  never  yet 
been  developed  ?  One  seeks  in  vain  for  a  facial 
angle  satisfying  Western  aesthetic  canons.  It  is 
seldom  that  one  meets  even  with  a  fine  example 
of  that  physical  elegance,  —  that  manifestation  of 
the  economy  of  force,  —  which  we  call  grace,  in 
the  Greek  meaning  of  the  word.  Yet  there  is 
charm  —  great  charm  —  both  of  face  and  form : 
the  charm  of  childhood  —  childhood  with  its  every 
feature  yet  softly  and  vaguely  outlined  (efface^  as  a 
French  artist  would  call  it),  —  childhood  before 
the  limbs  have  fully  lengthened, —  slight  and 
dainty,  with  admirable  little  hands  and  feet.  The 
eyes  at  first  surprise  us,  by  the  strangeness  of 
their  lids,  so  unlike  Aryan  eyelids,  and  folding 
upon  another  plan.  Yet  they  are  often  very 
charming ;  and  a  Western  artist  would  not  fail 
to  appreciate  the  graceful  terms,  invented  by 
Japanese  or  Chinese  art,  to  designate  particular 
beauties  in  the  lines  of  the  eyelids.  Even  if  she 
cannot  be  called  handsome,  according  to  Western 


396  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

standards,  the  Japanese  woman  must  be  confessed 
pretty,  —  pretty  like  a  comely  child ;  and  if  she 
be  seldom  graceful  in  the  Occidental  sense,  she  is 
at  least  in  all  her  ways  incomparably  graceful :  her 
every  motion,  gesture,  or  expression  being,  in  its 
own  Oriental  manner,  a  perfect  thing,  —  an  act  per 
formed,  or  a  look  conferred,  in  the  most  easy,  the 
most  graceful,  the  most  modest  way  possible.  By 
ancient  custom,  she  is  not  permitted  to  display  hei 
grace  in  the  street :  she  must  walk  in  a  particular 
shrinking  manner,  turning  her  feet  inward  as  she 
patters  along  upon  her  wooden  sandals.  But  to 
watch  her  at  home,  where  she  is  free  to  be  comely, 
—  merely  to  see  her  performing  any  household 
duty,  or  waiting  upon  guests,  or  arranging  flowers, 
or  playing  with  her  children,  —  is  an  education  in 
Far  Eastern  aesthetics  for  whoever  has  the  head 
and  the  heart  to  learn.  .  .  .  But  is  she  not,  then, 
one  may  ask,  an  artificial  product,  —  a  forced 
growth  of  Oriental  civilization  ?  I  would  answer 
both  "Yes"  and  "No."  She  is  an  artificial  prod 
uct  in  only  the  same  evolutional  sense  that  all 
character  is  an  artificial  product;  and  it  required 
tens  of  centuries  to  mould  her.  She  is  not,  on  the 
other  hand,  an  artificial  type,  because  she  has  been 
particularly  trained  to  be  her  true  self  at  all  times 
when  circumstances  allow,  —  or,  in  other  words,  to 
be  delightfully  natural.  The  old-fashioned  educa 
tion  of  her  sex  was  directed  to  the  development 


FEUDAL   INTEGRATION  397 

of  every  quality  essentially  feminine,  and  to  the 
suppression  of  the  opposite  quality.  Kindliness, 
docility,  sympathy,  tenderness,  daintiness  —  these 
and  other  attributes  were  cultivated  into  incom 
parable  blossoming.  "  Be  good,  sweet  maid,  and 
let  who  will  be  clever :  do  noble  things,  not  dream 

them,  all  day  long  " those  words  of  Kingsley 

really  embody  the  central  idea  in  her  training. 
Of  course  the  being,  formed  by  such  training 
only,  must  be  protected  by  society ;  and  by  the 
old  Japanese  society  she  was  protected.  Excep 
tions  did  not  affect  the  rule.  What  I  mean  is  that 
she  was  able  to  be  purely  herself,  within  certain 
limits  of  emotional  etiquette,  in  all  security.  Her 
success  in  life  was  made  to  depend  on  her  power 
to  win  affection  by  gentleness,  obedience,  kindli 
ness  ;  —  not  the  affection  merely  of  a  husband,  but 
of  the  husband's  parents  and  grandparents,  and 
brothers-in-law  and  sisters-in-law,  —  in  short  of 
all  the  members  of  a  strange  household.  Thus 
to  succeed  required  angelic  goodness  and  patience ; 
and  the  Japanese  woman  realized  at  least  the  ideal 
of  a  Buddhist  angel.  A  being  working  only  for 
others,  thinking  only  for  others,  happy  only  in 
making  pleasure  for  others,  —  a  being  incapable 
of  unkindness,  incapable  of  selfishness,  incapable 
of  acting  contrary  to  her  own  inherited  sense  of 
right,  —  and  in  spite  of  this  softness  and  gentleness 
ready,  at  any  moment,  to  lay  down  her  life,  to 


398  FEUDAL   INTEGRATION 

sacrifice  everything  at  the  cali  of  duty  :  such  was 
the  character  of  the  Japanese  woman.  Most 
strange  may  seem  the  combination,  in  this  child- 
soul,  of  gentleness  and  force,  tenderness  and 
courage,  —  yet  the  explanation  is  not  far  to  seek. 
Stronger  within  her  than  wifely  affection  or  pa 
rental  affection  or  even  maternal  affection, —  stronger 
than  any  womanly  emotion,  was  the  moral  convic 
tion  born  of  her  great  faith.  This  religious  quality 
of  character  can  be  found  among  ourselves  only 
within  the  shadow  of  cloisters,  where  it  is  cultivated 
at  the  expense  of  all  else ;  and  the  Japanese  woman 
has  been  therefore  compared  to  a  Sister  of  Charity. 
But  she  had  to  be  very  much  more  than  a  Sister 
of  Charity,  —  daughter-in-law  and  wife  and  mother, 
and  to  fulfil  without  reproach  the  multiform  duties 
of  her  triple  part.  Rather  might  she  be  compared 
to  the  Greek  type  of  noble  woman,  —  to  Antigone, 
to  Alcestis.  With  the  Japanese  woman,  as  formed 
by  the  ancient  training,  each  act  of  life  was  an  act 
of  faith  :  her  existence  was  a  religion,  her  home  a 
temple,  her  every  word  and  thought  ordered  by 
the  law  of  the  cult  of  the  dead.  .  .  .  This  won 
derful  type  is  not  extinct  —  though  surely  doomed 
to  disappear.  A  human  creature  so  shaped  for  the 
service  of  gods  and  men  that  every  beat  of  her  heart 
is  duty,  that  every  drop  of  her  blood  is  moral  feel 
ing,  were  not  less  out  of  place  in  the  future  world 
of  competitive  selfishness,  than  an  angel  in  hell. 


The   Shinto  Revival 


The   Shinto   Revival 

THE  slow  weakening  of  the  Tokugawa  Sh5- 
gunate  was  due  to  causes  not  unlike  those 
which  had  brought  about  the  decline  of  pre 
vious  regencies  :  the  race  degenerated  during  that 
long  period  of  peace  which  its  rule  had  inaugurated  ; 
the  strong  builders  were  succeeded  by  feebler  and 
feebler  men.  Nevertheless  the  machinery  of  admin 
istration,  astutely  devised  by  lyeyasu,  and  further 
perfected  by  lyemitsu,  worked  so  well  that  the 
enemies  of  the  Shogunate  could  find  no  opportunity 
for  a  successful  attack  until  foreign  aggression  un 
expectedly  came  to  their  aid.  The  most  dangerous 
enemies  of  the  government  were  the  great  clans  of 
Satsuma  and  Choshu.  lyeyasu  had  not  ventured 
to  weaken  them  beyond  a  certain  point:  the  risks 
of  the  undertaking  would  have  been  great ;  and,  on 
the  other  hand,  the  alliance  of  those  clans  was  for 
the  time  being  a  matter  of  vast  political  importance. 
He  only  took  measures  to  preserve  a  safe  balance 
of  power,  placing  between  those  formidable  allies 
new  lordships  in  whose  rulers  he  could  put  trust, — 
a  trust  based  first  upon  interest,  secondly  upon  kin 
ship.  But  he  always  felt  that  danger  to  the  Sho- 

2D  401 


402  THE    SHINTO    REVIVAL 

gunate  might  come  from  Satsuma  and  Choshu ;  and 
he  left  to  his  successors  careful  instructions  about 
the  policy  to  be  followed  in  dealing  with  such  pos 
sible  enemies.  He  felt  that  his  work  was  not  per 
fect,  —  that  certain  outlying  blocks  of  the  structure 
had  not  been  properly  clamped  to  the  rest.  He  could 
not  do  more  in  the  direction  of  consolidation,  simply 
because  the  material  of  society  had  not  yet  sufficiently 
evolved,  had  not  yet  become  plastic  enough,  to  per 
mit  of  perfect  and  permanent  cohesion.  In  order 
to  effect  that,  it  would  have  been  necessary  to  dis 
solve  the  clans.  But  lyeyasu  did  all  that  human 
foresight  could  have  safely  attempted  under  the  cir' 
cumstances  ;  and  no  one  was  more  keenly  conscious 
than  himself  of  the  weak  points  in  his  wonderful 
organization. 

For  more  than  two  hundred  years  the  Satsuma 
and  Choshu  clans,  and  several  others  ready  to  league 
with  them,  submitted  to  the  discipline  of  the  Toku- 
gawa  rule.  But  they  chafed  under  it,  and  watched 
for  a  chance  to  break  the  yoke.  All  the  while  this 
chance  was  being  slowly  created  for  them  —  not  by 
any  political  changes,  but  by  the  patient  toil  of 
Japanese  men  of  letters.  Three  among  these  —  the 
greatest  scholars  that  Japan  ever  produced  —  espe 
cially  prepared  the  way,  by  their  intellectual  labours, 
for  the  abolition  of  the  Shdgunate.  They  were 
Shinto  scholars  ;  and  they  represented  the  not  un 
natural  reaction  of  native  conservatism  against  the 


THE   SHINTO    REVIVAL  403 

long  tyranny  of  alien  ideas  and  alien  beliefs, — - 
against  the  literature  and  philosophy  and  bureau 
cracy  of  China,  —  against  the  preponderant  influence 
upon  education  of  the  foreign  religion  of  Buddhism. 
To  all  this  they  opposed  the  old  native  literature  of 
Japan,  the  ancient  poetry,  the  ancient  cult,  the  early 
traditions  and  rites  of  Shinto.  The  names  of  these 
three  remarkable  men  were  Mabuchi  (1697-1769), 
Motowori  (1730-1801),  and  Hirata  (1776-1843). 
Their  efforts  actually  resulted  in  the  disestablish 
ment  of  Buddhism,  and  in  the  great  Shinto  revival 
of  1871. 

The  intellectual  revolution  made  by  these  scholars 
could  have  been  prepared  only  during  a  long  era  of 
peace,  and  by  men  enjoying  the  protection  and 
patronage  of  members  of  the  ruling  class.  By  a 
strange  chance,  it  was  the  house  of  Tokugawa  itself 
which  first  gave  to  literature  such  encouragement 
and  aid  as  made  possible  the  labours  of  the  Shinto 
scholars.  lyeyasu  had  been  a  lover  of  learning; 
and  had  devoted  the  later  years  of  his  life  —  passed 
in  retirement  at  Shidzuoka  —  to  the  collection  of 
ancient  books  and  manuscripts.  He  bequeathed  his 
Japanese  books  to  his  eighth  son,  the  Prince  of 
Owari ;  and  his  Chinese  books  to  another  son,  the 
Prince  of  Kishu.  The  Prince  of  Owari  himself  com 
posed  several  works  upon  Japanese  early  literature. 
Other  descendants  of  lyeyasu  inherited  the  great 


404  THE   SHINTO    REVIVAL 

Shogun's  love  of  letters :  one  of  his  grandsons, 
Mitsukuni,  the  second  Prince  of  Mito  (1622-1700), 
compiled,  with  the  aid  of  various  scholars,  the  first 
important  history  of  Japan,  —  the  Dai-Nihon-Shiy  in 
240  books.  Also  he  compiled  a  work  of  500  vol 
umes  upon  the  ceremonies  and  the  etiquette  of  the 
Imperial  Court,  and  set  aside  from  his  revenues  a 
sum  equal  to  about  ^£30,000  per  annum,  to  cover 
the  cost  of  publishing  the  splendid  productions.  .  .  . 
Under  the  patronage  of  great  lords  like  these  — 
collectors  of  libraries  —  there  gradually  developed  a 
new  school  of  men-of-letters  :  men  who  turned  away 
from  Chinese  literature  to  the  study  of  the  Jap 
anese  classics.  They  reedited  the  ancient  poetry 
and  chronicles ;  they  republished  the  sacred  rec 
ords,  with  ample  commentaries.  They  produced 
whole  libraries  of  works  upon  religious,  histori 
cal,  and  philological  subjects  ;  they  made  grammars 
and  dictionaries ;  they  wrote  treatises  on  the  art 
of  poetry,  on  popular  errors,  on  the  nature  of  the 
gods,  on  government,  on  the  manners  and  customs 
of  ancient  days.  .  .  .  The  foundations  of  this  new 
scholarship  were  laid  by  two  Shinto  priests,  —  Kada 
and  Mabuchi. 

The  high  patrons  of  learning  never  suspected 
the  possible  results  of  those  researches  which  they 
had  encouraged  and  aided.  The  study  of  the  an 
cient  records,  the  study  of  Japanese  literature,  the 
study  of  the  early  political  and  religious  conditions, 


THE   SHINTO   REVIVAL  405 

naturally  led  men  to  consider  the  history  of  those 
foreign  literary  influences  which  had  well-nigh 
stifled  native  learning,  and  to  consider  also  the  his 
tory  of  the  foreign  creed  which  had  overwhelmed 
the  religion  of  the  ancestral  gods.  Chinese  ethics, 
Chinese  ceremonial,  and  Chinese  Buddhism  had 
reduced  the  ancient  faith  to  the  state  of  a  minor 
belief — almost  to  the  state  of  a  superstition.  "The 
Shinto  gods,"  exclaimed  one  of  the  scholars  of  the 
new  school,  "  have  become  the  servants  of  the  Bud- 
dhas  !  "  But  those  Shinto  gods  were  the  ancestors 
of  the  race,  —  the  fathers  of  its  emperors  and  princes, 
—  and  their  degradation  could  not  but  involve  the 
degradation  of  the  imperial  tradition.  Already,  in 
deed,  the  emperors  had  been  deprived  not  only  of 
their  immemorial  rights  and  privileges,  but  of  their 
revenues:  many  had  been  deposed  and  banished  and 
insulted.  Just  as  the  gods  had  been  admitted  only 
as  inferior  personages  to  the  Buddhist  pantheon,  so 
their  living  descendants  were  now  permitted  to  reign 
only  as  the  dependants  of  military  usurpers.  By 
sacred  law  the  whole  soil  of  the  empire  belonged  to 
the  Heavenly  Sovereign  :  yet  there  had  been  great 
poverty  at  times  in  the  imperial  palace ;  and  the 
revenues,  allotted  for  the  maintenance  of  the 
Mikado,  had  often  been  insufficient  to  relieve  his 
family  from  want.  Assuredly  all  this  was  wrong. 
The  Shogunate  had  indeed  established  peace  and 
inaugurated  prosperity  ;  but  who  could  forget  that 


^06  THE    SHINTO    REVIVAL 

it  had  originated  in  a  military  usurpation  of  impe 
rial  rights?  Only  by  the  restoration  of  the  Son  of 
Heaven  to  his  ancient  position  of  power,  and  by  the 
relegation  of  the  military  chiefs  to  their  proper  state 
of  subordination,  could  the  best  interests  of  the 
nation  be  really  served.  .  .  . 

All  this  was  thought  and  felt  and  strongly  sug 
gested;  but  not  all  of  it  was  openly  proclaimed.  To 
have  publicly  preached  against  the  military  govern 
ment  as  a  usurpation  would  have  been  to  invite 
destruction.  The  Shinto  scholars  dared  only  so 
much  as  the  politics  and  the  temper  of  their  time 
seemed  to  permit,  —  though  they  closely  approached 
the  danger-line.  By  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  cen 
tury,  however,  their  teaching  had  created  a  strong 
party  in  favour  of  the  official  revival  of  the  ancient 
religion,  the  restoration  of  the  Mikado  to  supreme 
power,  and  the  repression,  if  not  suppression,  of 
the  military  power.  Yet  it  was  not  until  the  year 
1841  that  the  Shogunate  took  alarm,  and  proclaimed 
its  disquiet  by  banishing  from  the  capital  the  great 
scholar  Hirata,  and  forbidding  him  to  write  any 
thing  more.  Not  long  afterwards  he  died.  But  he 
had  been  able  to  teach  for  forty  years ;  he  had 
written  and  published  several  hundred  volumes ; 
and  the  school  of  which  he  was  the  last  and  greatest 
theologian  already  exerted  far-reaching  influence. 
The  restive  lords  of  Choshu,  Satsuma,  Tosa,  and 
Hizen  were  watching  and  waiting.  They  perceived 


THE   SHINTO    REVIVAL  407 

the  worth  of  the  new  ideas  to  their  own  policy  ;  they 
encouraged  the  new  Shintdism  ;  they  felt  that  a  time 
was  coming  when  they  could  hope  to  shake  off  the 
domination  of  the  Tokugawa.  And  their  oppor 
tunity  came  at  last  with  the  advent  to  Japan  of 
Commodore  Perry's  fleet. 

The  events  of  that  time  are  well  known,  and  need 
not  here  be  dwelt  upon  at  any  length.  Suffice  to 
say  that  after  the  Shogunate  had  been  terrified  into 
making  commercial  treaties  with  the  United  States 
and  other  powers,  and  practically  compelled  to  open 
sundry  ports  to  foreign  trade,  great  discontent  arose 
and  was  fomented  as  much  as  possible  by  the  ene 
mies  of  the  military  government.  Meanwhile  the 
Shogunate  had  ascertained  for  itself  the  impossibility 
of  resisting  foreign  aggression :  it  was  fairly  well 
informed  as  to  the  strength  of  Western  countries. 
The  imperial  court  was  nowise  informed  ;  and  the 
Shogunate  naturally  dreaded  to  furnish  the  informa 
tion.  To  acknowledge  incapacity  to  resist  Occi 
dental  aggression  would  be  to  invite  the  ruin  of  the 
Tokugawa  house ;  to  resist,  on  the  other  hand, 
would  be  to  invite  the  destruction  of  the  Empire. 
The  enemies  of  the  Shogunate  then  persuaded  the 
imperial  court  to  order  the  expulsion  of  the  for 
eigners ;  and  this  order  —  which,  it  must  be  remem 
bered,  was  essentially  a  religious  order,  emanating 
from  the  source  of  all  acknowledged  authority  — 
placed  the  military  government  in  a  serious  dilemma. 


4o8  THE   SHINTO    REVIVAL 

It  tried  to  effect  by  diplomacy  what  it  could  not 
accomplish  by  force ;  but  while  it  was  negotiating 
for  the  withdrawal  of  the  foreign  settlers,  matters 
were  suddenly  forced  to  a  crisis  by  the  Prince  of 
Ch5shu,  who  fired  upon  various  ships  belonging  to 
the  foreign  powers.  This  action  provoked  the  bom 
bardment  of  Shimonoseki,  and  the  demand  of  an 
indemnity  of  three  million  dollars.  The  Shogun 
lyemochi  attempted  to  chastise  the  daimyo  of 
Choshu  for  this  act  of  hostility ;  but  the  attempt 
only  proved  the  weakness  of  the  military  govern 
ment,  lyemochi  died  soon  after  this  defeat ;  and 
his  successor  Hitotsubashi  had  no  chance  to  do  any 
thing,  —  for  the  now  evident  feebleness  of  the  Sh5- 
gunate  gave  its  enemies  courage  to  strike  a  fatal 
blow.  Pressure  was  brought  upon  the  imperial 
court  to  proclaim  the  abolition  of  the  Shogunate; 
and  the  Shogunate  was  abolished  by  decree.  Hitot 
subashi  submitted ;  and  the  Tokugawa  regime  thus 
came  to  an  end,  —  although  its  more  devoted  fol 
lowers  warred  for  two  years  afterwards,  against  hope 
less  odds,  to  reestablish  it.  In  1867  the  entire 
administration  was  reorganized  ;  the  supreme  power, 
both  military  and  civil,  being  restored  to  the 
Mikado.  Soon  afterward  the  Shinto  cult,  officially 
revived  in  its  primal  simplicity,  was  declared  the 
Religion  of  State ;  and  Buddhism  was  disendowed. 
Thus  the  Empire  was  reestablished  upon  the 
ancient  lines ;  and  all  that  the  literary  party  had 


THE   SHINTO   REVIVAL  409 

hoped    for    seemed    to    be    realized  —  except    one 
thing.  .  .  . 

Be  it  here  observed  that  the  adherents  of  the 
literary  party  wanted  to  go  much  further  than  the 
great  founders  of  the  new  Shintoism  had  dreamed 
of  going.  These  later  enthusiasts  were  not  satisfied 
with  the  abolition  of  the  Sh5gunate,  the  restoration 
of  imperial  power,  and  the  revival  of  the  ancient 
cult :  they  wanted  a  return  of  all  society  to  the 
simplicity  of  primitive  times ;  they  desired  that  all 
foreign  influence  should  be  got  rid  of,  and  that  the 
official  ceremonies,  the  future  education,  the  future 
literature,  the  ethics,  the  laws,  should  be  purely 
Japanese.  They  were  not  even  satisfied  with  the 
disendowment  of  Buddhism  :  there  was  a  vigorous 
proposal  made  for  its  total  suppression !  And  all 
this  would  have  signified,  in  more  ways  than  one, 
a  social  retrogression  towards  barbarism.  The  great 
scholars  had  never  proposed  to  cast  away  Buddhism 
and  all  Chinese  learning ;  they  had  only  insisted 
that  the  native  religion  and  culture  should  have  pre 
cedence.  But  the  new  literary  party  desired  what 
would  have  been  equivalent  to  the  destruction  of  a 
thousand  years*  experience.  Happily  the  clansmen 
who  had  broken  down  the  Shogunate  saw  both  past 
and  future  in  another  light.  They  understood  that 
the  national  existence  was  in  peril,  and  that  resist 
ance  to  foreign  pressure  would  be  hopeless.  Satsuma 
had  witnessed  the  bombardment  of  Kagoshima  in 


410  THE    SHINTO    REVIVAL 

1863  ;  Choshu,  the  bombardment  of  Shimonoseki 
in  1864.  Evidently  the  only  chance  of  being  able 
to  face  Western  power  would  be  through  the  patient 
study  of  Western  science ;  and  the  survival  of  the 
Empire  depended  upon  the  Europeanization  of 
society.  By  1871  the  daimiates  were  abolished; 
in  1873  the  edicts  against  Christianity  were  with 
drawn;  in  1876  the  wearing  of  swords  was  pro 
hibited.  The  samurai,  as  a  military  body,  were 
suppressed ;  and  all  classes  were  declared  thence 
forward  equal  before  the  law.  New  codes  were 
compiled ;  a  new  army  and  navy  organized ;  a  new 
police  system  established  ;  a  new  system  of  educa 
tion  introduced  at  Government  expense ;  and  a  new 
constitution  promised.  Finally,  in  1891,  the  first 
Japanese  parliament  (strictly  speaking)  was  convoked. 
By  that  time  the  entire  framework  of  society  had 
been  remodelled,  so  far  as  laws  could  remodel  it, 
upon  a  European  pattern.  The  nation  had  fairly 
entered  upon  its  third  period  of  integration.  The 
clan  had  been  legally  dissolved ;  the  family  was  no 
longer  the  legal  unit  of  society  :  by  the  new  consti 
tution  the  individual  had  been  recognized. 

When  we  consider  the  history  of  some  vast  and 
sudden  political  change  in  its  details  only,  —  the 
factors  of  the  movement,  the  combinations  of  imme 
diate  cause  and  effect,  the  influences  of  strong  per 
sonality,  the  conditions  impelling  individual  action, 


THE    SHINTO    REVIVAL  4u 

—  then  the  transformation  is  apt  to  appear  to  us  the 
work  and  the  triumph  of  a  few  superior  minds.  We 
forget,  perhaps,  that  those  minds  themselves  were  the 
product  of  their  epoch,  and  that  every  such  rapid 
change  must  represent  the  working  of  a  national 
or  race-instinct  quite  as  much  as  the  operation  of 
individual  intelligence.  The  events  of  the  Meiji 
reconstruction  strangely  illustrate  the  action  of 
such  instinct  in  the  face  of  peril,  —  the  readjust 
ment  of  internal  relations  to  sudden  changes  of 
environment.  The  nation  had  found  its  old  political 
system  powerless  before  the  new  conditions  ;  and  it 
transformed  that  system.  It  had  found  its  military 
organization  incapable  of  defending  it;  and  it  recon 
structed  that  organization.  It  had  found  its  educa 
tional  system  useless  in  the  presence  of  unforeseen 
necessities  ;  and  it  replaced  that  system,  —  simultan 
eously  crippling  the  power  of  Buddhism,  which 
might  otherwise  have  offered  serious  opposition  to 
the  new  developments  required.  And  in  that  hour 
of  greatest  danger  the  national  instinct  turned  back 
at  once  to  the  moral  experience  upon  which  it  could 
best  rely,  —  the  experience  embodied  in  its  ancient 
cult,  the  religion  of  unquestioning  obedience.  Re 
lying  upon  Shinto  tradition,  the  people  rallied 
about  their  ruler,  descendant  of  the  ancient  gods, 
and  awaited  his  will  with  unconquerable  zeal  of 
faith.  By  strict  obedience  to  his  commands  the 
peril  might  be  averted,  —  never  otherwise  :  this  was 


412  THE   SHINTO   REVIVAL 

the  national  conviction.  And  the  imperial  ordei 
was  simply  that  the  nation  should  strive  by  study 
to  make  itself,  as  far  as  possible,  the  intellectual 
equal  of  its  enemies.  How  faithfully  that  command 
was  obeyed,  - —  how  well  the  old  moral  discipline  of 
the  race  served  it  in  the  period  of  that  supreme 
emergency,  —  I  need  scarcely  say.  Japan,  by  right 
of  self-acquired  strength,  has  entered  into  the  circle 
of  the  modern  civilized  powers,  —  formidable  by 
her  new  military  organization,  respectable  through 
her  achievements  in  the  domain  of  practical  science. 
And  the  force  to  effect  this  astonishing  self- 
improvement,  within  the  time  of  thirty  years, 
she  owes  assuredly  to  the  moral  habit  derived 
from  her  ancient  cult,  —  the  religion  of  the 
ancestors.  To  fairly  measure  the  feat,  we  should 
remember  that  Japan  was  evolutionally  younger 
than  any  modern  European  nation,  by  at  least 
twenty-seven  hundred  years,  when  she  went  to 
school !  .  .  . 

Herbert  Spencer  has  shown  that  the  great  value 
to  society  of  ecclesiastical  institutions  lies  in  their 
power  to  give  cohesion  to  the  mass,  —  to  strengthen 
rule  by  enforcing  obedience  to  custom,  and  by  op 
posing  innovations  likely  to  supply  any  element 
of  disintegration.  In  other  words,  the  value  of  a 
religion,  from  the  sociological  standpoint,  lies  in  its 
conservatism.  Various  writers  have  alleged  that  the 


THE   SHINTO    REVIVAL  413 

Japanese  national  religion  proved  itself  weak  by 
incapacity  to  resist  the  overwhelming  influence  of 
Buddhism.  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  the  entire 
social  history  of  Japan  yields  proof  to  the  contrary. 
Though  Buddhism  did  for  a  long  period  appear  to 
have  almost  entirely  absorbed  Shinto,  by  the  ac 
knowledgment  of  the  Shinto  scholars  themselves 
though  Buddhist  emperors  reigned  who  neglected 
or  despised  the  cult  of  their  ancestors ;  though 
Buddhism  directed,  during  ten  centuries,  the  educa 
tion  of  the  nation,  Shinto  remained  all  the  while 
so  very  much  alive  that  it  was  able  not  only  to  dis 
possess  its  rival  at  last,  but  to  save  the  country 
from  foreign  domination.  To  assert  that  the  Shinto 
revival  signified  no  more  than  a  stroke  of  policy 
imagined  by  a  group  of  statesmen,  is  to  ignore  all 
the  antecedents  of  the  event.  No  such  change 
could  have  been  wrought  by  mere  decree  had  not 
the  national  sentiment  welcomed  it.  ...  Moreover, 
there  are  three  important  facts  to  be  remembered 
in  regard  to  the  former  Buddhist  predomination : 
(i)  Buddhism  conserved  the  family-cult,  modifying 
the  forms  of  the  rite ;  (2)  Buddhism  never  really 
supplanted  the  Ujigami  cults,  but  maintained  them ; 
(3)  Buddhism  never  interfered  with  the  imperial 
cult.  Now  these  three  forms  of  ancestor-worship, 
—  the  domestic,  the  communal,  and  the  national, — 
constitute  all  that  is  vital  in  Shint5.  No  single  es 
sential  of  the  ancient  faith  had  ever  been  weakened, 


4H  THE   SHINTO    REVIVAL 

much  less  abolished,  under  the   long   pressure  of 
Buddhism. 

The  Supreme  Cult  is  not  now  the  State  Religion ; 
by  request  of  the  chiefs  of  Shinto,  it  is  not  even 
officially  classed  as  a  religion.  Obvious  reasons  of 
state  policy  decided  this  course.  Having  fulfilled 
its  grand  task,  Shinto  abdicated.  But  as  representing 
all  those  traditions  which  appeal  to  race-feeling,  to 
the  sentiment  of  duty,  to  the  passion  of  loyalty,  and 
the  love  of  country,  it  yet  remains  an  immense  force, 
a  power  to  which  appeal  will  not  be  vainly  made  in 
another  hour  of  national  peril. 


Survivals 


Survivals 

IN  the  gardens  of  certain  Buddhist  temples  there 
are  trees  which  have  been  famous  for  centuries, 
—  trees  trained  and  clipped  into  extraordinary 
shapes.  Some  have  the  form  of  dragons;  others  have 
the  form  of  pagodas,  ships,  umbrellas.  Supposing  that 
one  of  these  trees  were  abandoned  to  its  own  natural 
tendencies,  it  would  eventually  lose  the  queer  shape 
so  long  imposed  upon  it;  but  the  outline  would 
not  be  altered  for  a  considerable  time,  as  the  new 
leafage  would  at  first  unfold  only  in  the  direction  of 
least  resistance :  that  is  to  say,  within  limits  origi 
nally  established  by  the  shears  and  the  pruning-knife. 
By  sword  and  law  the  old  Japanese  society  had  been 
pruned  and  clipped,  bent  and  bound,  just  like  such 
a  tree ;  and  after  the  reconstructions  of  the  Meiji 
period,  —  after  the  abolition  of  the  daimiates,  and 
the  suppression  of  the  military  class,  —  it  still  main 
tained  its  former  shape,  just  as  the  tree  would  con 
tinue  to  do  when  first  abandoned  by  the  gardener. 
Though  delivered  from  the  bonds  of  feudal  law, 
released  from  the  shears  of  military  rule,  the  great 
bulk  of  the  social  structure  preserved  its  ancient 
2E  417 


4i8  SURVIVALS 

aspect ,  and  the  rare  spectacle  bewildered  and  de* 
lighted  and  deluded  the  Western  observer.  Here 
indeed  was  Elf-land,  —  the  strange,  the  beautiful, 
the  grotesque,  the  very  mysterious,  —  totally  unlike 
aught  of  strange  and  attractive  ever  beheld  else 
where.  It  was  not  a  world  of  the  nineteenth  cen 
tury  after  Christ,  but  a  world  of  many  centuries 
before  Christ :  yet  this  fact  —  the  wonder  of  won 
ders —  remained  unrecognized ;  and  it  remains  un 
recognized  by  most  people  even  to  this  day. 

Fortunate  indeed  were  those  privileged  to  enter 
this  astonishing  fairyland  thirty  odd  years  ago,  be 
fore  the  period  of  superficial  change,  and  to  observe 
the  unfamiliar  aspects  of  its  life :  the  universal  urban 
ity,  the  smiling  silence  of  crowds,  the  patient  delib 
eration  of  toil,  the  absence  of  misery  and  struggle. 
Even  yet,  in  those  remoter  districts  where  alien 
influence  has  wrought  but  little  change,  the  charm 
of  the  old  existence  lingers  and  amazes ;  and  the 
ordinary  traveller  can  little  understand  what  it 
means.  That  all  are  polite,  that  nobody  quarrels, 
that  everybody  smiles,  that  pain  and  sorrow  remain 
invisible,  that  the  new  police  have  nothing  to  do, 
would  seem  to  prove  a  morally  superior  humanity. 
But  for  the  trained  sociologist  it  would  prove  some 
thing  different,  and  suggest  something  very  terrible. 
It  would  prove  to  him  that  this  society  had  been 
moulded  under  immense  coercion,  and  that  the 
coercion  must  have  been  exerted  uninterruptedly 


SURVIVALS  4iq 

for  thousands  of  years.  He  would  immediately 
perceive  that  ethics  and  custom  had  not  yet  be 
come  dissociated,  and  that  the  conduct  of  each 
person  was  regulated  by  the  will  of  the  rest.  He 
would  know  that  personality  could  not  develop  in 
such  a  social  medium,  —  that  no  individual  superi 
ority  dare  assert  itself,  that  no  competition  would 
be  tolerated.  He  would  understand  that  the  out 
ward  charm  of  this  life  —  its  softness,  its  smiling 
silence  as  of  dreams  —  signified  the  rule  of  the 
dead.  He  would  recognize  that  between  those 
minds  and  the  minds  of  his  own  epoch  no  kin 
ship  of  thought,  no  community  of  sentiment,  no 
sympathy  whatever  could  exist,  —  that  the  separating 
gulf  was  not  to  be  measured  by  thousands  of  leagues, 
but  only  by  thousands  of  years,  —  that  the  psycho 
logical  interval  was  hopeless  as  the  distance  from 
planet  to  planet.  Yet  this  knowledge  probably 
would  not  —  certainly  should  not  —  blind  him  to 
the  intrinsic  charm  of  things.  Not  to  feel  the 
beauty  of  this  archaic  life  is  to  prove  oneself  in 
sensible  to  all  beauty.  Even  that  Greek  world, 
for  which  our  scholars  and  poets  profess  such  lov 
ing  admiration,  must  have  been  in  many  ways  a 
world  of  the  same  kind,  whose  daily  mental  exist 
ence  no  modern  mind  could  share. 

Now   that   the  great   social   tree,  so   wonderfully 
clipped    and    cared    for    during    many    centuries, 


420  SURVIVALS 

is  losing  its  fantastic  shape,  let  us  try  to  see 
how  much  of  the  original  design  can  still  be 
traced. 

Under  all  the  outward  aspects  of  individual 
activity  that  modern  Japan  presents  to  the  visit 
or's  gaze,  the  ancient  conditions  really  persist  to 
an  extent  that  no  observation  could  reveal.  Still 
the  immemorial  cult  rules  all  the  land.  Still  the 
family-law,  the  communal  law,  and  (though  in  a 
more  irregular  manner)  the  clan-law,  control  every 
action  of  existence.  I  do  not  refer  to  any  written 
law,  but  only  to  the  old  unwritten  religious  law, 
with  its  host  of  obligations  deriving  from  ancestor- 
worship.  It  is  true  that  many  changes  —  and,  in 
the  opinion  of  the  wise,  too  many  changes  —  have 
been  made  in  civil  legislation ;  but  the  ancient 
proverb  :<  Government-laws  are  only  seven-day 
laws,"  Ftiil  represents  popular  sentiment  in  regard 
to  hasty  reforms.  The  old  law,  the  law  of  the 
dead,  is  that  by  which  the  millions  prefer  to 
act  and  think.  Though  ancient  social  groupings 
have  been  officially  abolished,  re-groupings  of  a 
corresponding  sort  have  been  formed,  instinctively, 
throughout  the  country  districts.  In  theory  the 
individual  is  free ;  in  practice  he  is  scarcely  more 
free  than  were  his  forefathers.  Old  penalties  for 
breach  of  custom  have  been  abrogated ;  yet  commu 
nal  opinion  is  able  to  compel  the  ancient  obedience. 
Legal  enactments  can  nowhere  effect  immediate 


SURVIVALS  421 

change  of  sentiment  and  long-established  usage, 
—  least  of  all  among  a  people  of  such  fixity  of 
character  as  the  Japanese.  Young  persons  are 
no  more  at  liberty  now,  than  were  their  fathers 
and  mothers  under  the  Shogunate,  to  marry  at 
will,  to  invest  their  means  and  efforts  in  undertak 
ings  not  sanctioned  by  family  approval,  to  consider 
themselves  in  any  way  enfranchised  from  family 
authority ;  and  it  is  probably  better  for  the  pres 
ent  that  they  are  not.  No  man  is  yet  complete 
master  of  his  activities,  his  time,  or  his  means. 

Though  the  individual  is  now  registered,  and  made 
directly  accountable  to  the  law,  while  the  household 
has  been  relieved  from  its  ancient  responsibility  for 
the  acts  of  its  members,  still  the  family  practically 
remains  the  social  unit,  retaining  its  patriarchal 
organization  and  its  particular  cult.  Not  unwisely, 
the  modern  legislators  have  protected  this  domestic 
religion :  to  weaken  its  bond  at  this  time  were  to 
weaken  the  foundations  of  the  national  moral  life,  — 
to  introduce  disintegrations  into  the  most  deeply 
seated  structures  of  the  social  organism.  The  new 
codes  forbid  the  man  who  becomes  by  succession  the 
head  of  a  house  to  abolish  that  house  :  he  is  not  per 
mitted  to  suppress  a  cult.  No  legal  presumptive  heir 
to  the  headship  of  a  family  can  enter  into  another 
family  as  adopted  son  or  husband ;  nor  can  he  aban 
don  the  paternal  house  to  establish  an  independent 


422  SURVIVALS 

family  of  his  own.1  Provision  has  been  made  to 
meet  extraordinary  cases ;  but  no  individual  is  al 
lowed,  without  good  and  sufficient  reason,  to  free 
himself  from  those  traditional  obligations  which  the 
family-cult  imposes.  As  regards  adoption,  the  new 
law  maintains  the  spirit  of  the  old,  with  fresh  pro 
vision  for  the  conservation  of  the  family  religion, — 
permitting  any  person  of  legal  age  to  adopt  a  son, 
on  the  simple  condition  that  the  person  adopted 
shall  be  younger  than  the  adopter.  The  new 
divorce-laws  do  not  permit  the  dismissal  of  a  wife 
for  sterility  alone  (and  divorce  for  such  cause  had 
long  been  condemned  by  Japanese  sentiment) ;  but^ 
in  view  of  the  facilities  given  for  adoption,  this  re 
form  does  not  endanger  the  continuance  of  the  cult. 
An  interesting  example  of  the  manner  in  which  the 
law  still  protects  ancestor-worship  is  furnished  by 
the  fact  that  an  aged  and  childless  widow,  last  repre 
sentative  of  her  family,  is  not  permitted  to  remain 
without  an  heir.  She  must  adopt  a  son  if  she  can  : 
if  she  cannot,  because  of  poverty,  or  for  other  rea- 

*  That  is  to  say,  he  cannot  separate  himself  from  the  family  in  law ;  but  he  is 
free  to  live  in  a  separate  house.  The  tendency  to  further  disintegration  of  the  family 
is  shown  by  a  custom  which  has  been  growing  of  late  years,  —  especially  in  TSkyo  : 
the  custom  of  demanding,  as  a  condition  of  marriage,  that  the  bride  shall  not  be 
obliged  to  live  in  the  same  house  with  the  parents  of  the  bridegroom,  This  custom 
is  yet  confined  to  certain  classes,  and  has  been  adversely  criticised.  Many  young 
men,  on  marrying,  leave  the  parental  home  to  begin  independent  housekeeping,  — 
though  remaining  legally  attached  to  their  parents'  families,  of  course.  ...  It 
will  perhaps  be  asked,  What  becomes  of  the  cult  in  such  cases  ?  The  cult  remains 
in  the  parental  home.  When  the  parents  die,  then  the  ancestral  tablets  are  trans 
ferred  to  the  home  of  the  married  son. 


SURVIVALS  423 

sons,  the  local  authorities  will  provide  a  son  for  her, 
—  that  is  to  say,  a  male  heir  to  maintain  the  family- 
worship.  Such  official  interference  would  seem  to 
us  tyrannical :  it  is  simply  paternal,  and  represents 
the  continuance  of  an  ancient  regulation  intended  to 
protect  the  bereaved  against  what  Eastern  faith  still 
deems  the  supreme  misfortune,  —  the  extinction  of 
the  home-cult.  ...  In  other  respects  the  later 
codes  allow  of  individual  liberty  unknown  in  previ 
ous  generations.  But  the  ordinary  person  would 
not  dream  of  attempting  to  claim  a  legal  right  opposed 
to  common  opinion.  Family  and  public  sentiment 
are  still  more  potent  than  law.  The  Japanese  news 
papers  frequently  reccrd  tragedies  resulting  from  the 
prevention  or  dissolution  of  unions  ;  and  these  trage 
dies  afford  strong  proof  that  most  young  people 
would  prefer  even  suicide  to  the  probable  conse 
quence  of  a  successful  appeal  to  law  against  family 
decision. 

The  communal  form  of  coercion  is  less  apparent 
in  the  large  cities ;  but  everywhere  it  endures  to 
some  extent,  and  in  the  agricultural  districts  it  re 
mains  supreme.  Between  the  new  conditions  and 
the  old  there  is  this  difference,  that  the  man  who 
finds  the  yoke  of  his  district  hard  to  bear  can  flee 
from  it :  he  could  not  do  so  fifty  years  ago.  But 
he  can  flee  from  it  only  to  enter  into  another  state 
of  subordination  of  nearly  the  same  kind.  Full 


424  SURVIVALS 

advantage,  nevertheless,  has  been  taken  of  this 
modern  liberty  of  movement :  thousands  yearly 
throng  to  the  cities  ;  other  thousands  travel  over  the 
country,  from  province  to  province ;  working  for  a 
year  or  a  season  in  one  place,  then  going  to  another, 
with  little  more  to  hope  for  than  experience  of 
change.  Emigration  also  has  been  taking  place 
upon  an  extensive  scale ;  but  for  the  common  class 
of  emigrants,  at  least,  the  advantage  of  emigration 
is  chiefly  represented  by  the  chance  of  earning  larger 
wages.  A  Japanese  emigrant  community  abroad 
organizes  itself  upon  the  home-plan ; 1  and  the  in 
dividual  emigrant  probably  finds  himself  as  much 
under  communal  coercion  in  Canada,  Hawaii,  or  the 
Philippine  Islands,  as  he  could  ever  have  been  in 
his  native  province.  Needless  to  say  that  in  foreign 
countries  such  coercion  is  more  than  compensated 
by  the  aid  and  protection  which  the  communal  or 
ganization  insures.  But  with  the  constantly  increas 
ing  number  of  restless  spirits  at  home,  and  the 
ever  widening  experience  of  Japanese  emigrants 

*  Except  as  regards  the  communal  cult,  perhaps.  The  domestic  cult  is  trans- 
planted ;  emigrants  who  go  abroad,  accompanied  by  their  families,  take  the  ances 
tral  tablets  with  them.  To  what  extent  the  communal  cult  may  have  been 
established  in  emigrant  communities,  I  have  not  yet  been  able  to  learn.  It  would 
appear,  however,  that  the  absence  of  Ujigami  in  certain  emigrant  settlements  is  to 
be  accounted  for  solely  by  the  pecuniary  difficulty  of  constructing  such  temples  and 
maintaining  competent  officials.  In  Formosa,  for  example,  though  the  domestic 
ancestor-cult  is  maintained  in  the  homes  of  the  Japanese  settlers,  Ujigami  have  not 
yet  been  established.  The  government,  however,  has  erected  several  important 
Shinto  temples ;  and  I  am  told  that  some  of  these  will  probably  be  converted  into 
Ujigami  when  the  Japanese  population  has  increased  enough  to  justify  the  measure. 


SURVIVALS  425 

abroad,  it  would  seem  likely  that  the  power  of  the 
commune  for  compulsory  cooperation  must  become 
considerably  weakened  in  the  near  future. 

As  for  the  tribal  or  clan  law,  it  survives  to  the 
degree  of  remaining  almost  omnipotent  in  adminis 
trative  circles,  and  in  all  politics.  Voters,  officials, 
legislators,  do  not  follow  principles  in  our  sense  of 
the  word :  they  follow  men,  and  obey  commands. 
In  these  spheres  of  action  the  penalties  of  disobe 
dience  to  orders  are  endless  as  well  as  serious  :  by 
a  single  such  offence  one  may  array  against  oneself 
powers  that  will  continue  their  hostile  operation 
for  years  and  years,  —  unreasoningly,  implacably, 
blindly,  with  the  weight  and  persistence  of  natural 
forces,  —  of  winds  or  tides.  Any  comprehension 
of  the  history  of  Japanese  politics  during  the  last 
fifteen  years  is  not  possible  without  some  know 
ledge  of  clan-history.  A  political  leader,  fully  ac 
quainted  with  the  history  of  clan-parties,  and  their 
offshoots,  can  accomplish  marvellous  things ;  and 
even  foreign  residents,  with  long  experience  of 
Japanese  life,  have  been  able,  by  pressing  upon 
clan-interests,  to  exercise  a  very  real  power  in  gov 
ernment  circles.  But  to  the  ordinary  foreigner, 
Japanese  contemporary  politics  must  appear  a  chaos, 
a  disintegration,  a  hopeless  flux.  The  truth  is  that 
most  things  remain,  under  varying  outward  forms, 
"  as  all  were  ordered,  ages  since,"  —  though  the 


426  SURVIVALS 

shiftings  have  become  more  rapid,  and  the  results 
less  obvious,  in  the  haste  of  an  era  of  steam  and 
electricity. 

The  greatest  of  living  Japanese  statesmen,  the 
Marquis  Ito,  long  ago  perceived  that  the  tendency 
of  political  life  to  agglomerations,  to  clan-groupings, 
presented  the  most  serious  obstacle  to  the  successful 
working  of  constitutional  government.  He  under 
stood  that  this  tendency  could  be  opposed  only  by 
considerations  weightier  than  clan-interests,  consider 
ations  worthy  of  supreme  sacrifice.  He  therefore 
formed  a  party  of  which  every  member  was  pledged 
to  pass  over  clan-interests,  clique-interests,  personal 
and  every  other  kind  of  interests,  for  the  sake  of 
national  interests.  Brought  into  collision  with  a 
hostile  cabinet  in  1903,  this  party  achieved  the  feat 
of  controlling  its  animosities  even  to  the  extent  of 
maintaining  its  foes  in  power  ;  but  large  fragments 
broke  off  in  the  process.  So  profoundly  is  the 
grouping-tendency,  the  clan-sentiment,  identified 
with  national  character,  that  the  ultimate  success  of 
Marquis  Ito's  policy  must  still  be  considered  doubt 
ful.  Only  a  national  danger — the  danger  of  war, 
—  has  yet  been  able  to  weld  all  parties  together,  to 
make  all  wills  work  as  one. 

Not  only  politics,  but  nearly  all  phases  of  modern 
life,  yield  evidence  that  the  disintegration  of  the  old 
society  has  been  superficial  rather  than  fundamental. 
Structures  dissolved  have  recrystallized,  taking  forms 


SURVIVALS  427 

dissimilar  in  aspect  to  the  original  forms,  but  in 
wardly  built  upon  the  same  plan.  For  the  dissolu 
tions  really  effected  represented  only  a  separation  of 
masses,  not  a  breaking  up  of  substance  into  inde 
pendent  units ;  and  these  masses,  again  cohering, 
continue  to  act  only  as  masses.  Independence 
of  personal  action,  in  the  Western  sense,  is  still 
almost  inconceivable.  The  individual  of  every 
class  above  the  lowest  must  continue  to  be  at  once 
coercer  and  coerced.  Like  an  atom  within  a  solid 
body,  he  can  vibrate ;  but  the  orbit  of  his  vibration 
is  fixed.  He  must  act  and  be  acted  upon  in  ways 
differing  little  from  those  of  ancient  time. 

As  for  being  acted  upon,  the  average  man  is  under 
three  kinds  of  pressure :  pressure  from  above,  ex 
emplified  in  the  will  of  his  superiors ;  pressure 
about  him,  represented  by  the  common  will  of 
his  fellows  and  equals ;  pressure  from  below,  rep 
resented  by  the  general  sentiment  of  his  inferiors. 
And  this  last  sort  of  coercion  is  not  the  least 
formidable. 

Individual  resistance  to  the  first  kind  of  pressure 
—  that  represented  by  authority  —  is  not  even  to  be 
thought  of ;  because  the  superior  represents  a  clan, 
a  class,  an  exceedingly  multiple  power  of  some  de 
scription  ;  and  no  solitary  individual,  in  the  present 
order  of  things,  can  strive  against  a  combination. 
To  resist  injustice  he  must  find  ample  support,  in 


428  SURVIVALS 

which  case  his  resistance  does  not  represent  indi 
vidual  action. 

Resistance  to  the  second  kind  of  pressure  —  com 
munal  coercion  —  signifies  ruin,  loss  of  the  right  to 
form  a  part  of  the  social  body. 

Resistance  to  the  third  sort  of  pressure,  embodied 
in  the  common  sentiment  of  inferiors,  may  result  in 
almost  anything,  —  from  momentary  annoyance  to 
sudden  death,  —  according  to  circumstances. 

In  all  forms  of  society  these  three  kinds  of  press 
ure  are  exerted  to  some  degree ;  but  in  Japanese 
society,  owing  to  inherited  tendency,  and  traditiona) 
sentiment,  their  power  is  tremendous. 

Thus,  in  every  direction,  the  individual  finds 
himself  confronted  by  the  despotism  of  collective 
u-~opinion :  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  act  with  safety 
except  as  one  unit  of  a  combination.  The  first 
kind  of  pressure  deprives  him  of  moral  freedom, 
exacting  unlimited  obedience  to  orders ;  the  sec 
ond  kind  of  pressure  denies  him  the  right  to  use 
his  best  faculties  in  the  best  way  for  his  own  advan 
tage  (that  is  to  say,  denies  him  the  right  of  free 
competition) ;  the  third  kind  of  pressure  compels 
him,  in  directing  the  actions  of  others,  to  follow 
tradition,  to  forbear  innovations,  to  avoid  making 
any  changes,  however  beneficial,  which  do  not  find 
willing  acceptance  on  the  part  of  his  inferiors. 

These   are   the    social    conditions   which,   under 


SURVIVALS  429 

normal  circumstances,  make  for  stability,  for  con 
servation  ;  and  they  represent  the  will  of  the  dead. 
They  are  inevitable  to  a  militant  state ;  they  make 
the  strength  of  that  state ;  they  render  facile  the 
creation  and  maintenance  of  formidable  armies. 
But  they  are  not  conditions  favourable  to  success  in 
the  future  international  competition,  —  in  the  indus 
trial  struggle  for  existence  against  societies  incom 
parably  more  plastic,  and  of  higher  mental  energy. 


Modern   Restraints 


Modern  Restraints 

FOR  even  a   vague  understanding  of  modern 
Japan,  it  will   be    necessary  to  consider  the 
effect  of  the  three  forms  of  social  coercion, 
mentioned  in  the    preceding   chapter,  as    restraints 
upon    individual    energy   and    capacity.     All    three 
represent  survivals  of  the  ancient  religious  respon 
sibility.     I    shall    treat  of  them   in    order  inverse, 
beginning  with  the  under-pressure. 

It  has  often  been  asserted  by  foreign  observers 
that  the  real  power  in  Japan  is  exercised  not  from 
above,  but  from  below.  There  is  some  truth  in 
this  assertion,  but  not  all  the  truth :  the  conditions 
are  much  too  complex  to  be  covered  by  any  general 
statement.  What  cannot  be  gainsaid  is  that  supe 
rior  authority  has  always  been  more  or  less  restrained 
by  tendencies  to  resistance  from  below.  .  .  .  At 
no  time  in  Japanese  history,  for  example,  do  the 
peasants  appear  to  have  been  left  without  recourse 
against  excessive  oppression,  —  notwithstanding  all 
the  humiliating  regulations  imposed  on  their  exist 
ence.  They  were  suffered  to  frame  their  own 
village-laws,  to  estimate  the  possible  amount  of 
2F  433 


434  MODERN    RESTRAINTS 

their  tax  payments,  and  to  make  protest  —  through 
official  channels — against  unmerciful  exaction.  They 
were  made  to  pay  as  much  as  they  could ;  but  they 
were  not  reduced  to  bankruptcy  or  starvation ;  and 
trieir  holdings  were  mostly  secured  to  them  by  laws 
forbidding  the  sale  or  alienation  of  family  property. 
Such  was  at  least  the  general  rule.  There  were, 
however,  wicked  daimyo,  who  treated  their  farmers 
with  extreme  cruelty,  and  found  ways  to  prevent 
complaints  or  protests  from  reaching  the  higher 
authorities.  The  almost  invariable  result  of  such 
tyranny  was  revolt ;  and  the  tyrant  was  then  made 
responsible  for  the  disorder,  and  punished.  Though 
denied  in  theory,  the  right  of  the  peasant  to  rebel 
against  oppression  was  respected  in  practice ;  the 
revolt  was  punished,  but  the  oppressor  was  like 
wise  punished.  Daimyo  were  obliged  to  reckon 
with  their  farmers  in  regard  to  any  fresh  imposition 
of  taxes  or  forced  labour.  We  also  find  that  al 
though  heimin  were  made  subject  to  the  military 
class,  it  was  possible  for  artizans  and  commercial 
folk  to  form,  in  the  great  cities,  strong  associations 
by  which  military  tyranny  was  kept  in  check. 
Everywhere  the  reverential  deference  of  the  com 
mon  people  to  authority,  as  exercised  in  usual  direc 
tions,  seems  to  have  been  accompanied  by  an 
extraordinary  readiness  to  defy  authority  exercised 
in  other  directions. 

It  may  seem  strange  that  a  society  in  which  reli- 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  435 

gion  and  government,  ethics  and  custom,  were  prac 
tically  identical,  should  furnish  striking  examples  of 
resistance  to  authority.  But  the  religious  fact  itself 
supplies  the  explanation.  From  the  earliest  period 
there  was  firmly  established,  in  the  popular  mind, 
the  conviction  that  implicit  obedience  to  authority 
was  the  universal  duty  under  all  ordinary  circum 
stances.  But  with  this  conviction  there  was  united 
another,  —  that  resistance  to  authority  (excepting 
the  sacred  authority  of  the  Supreme  Ruler)  was 
equally  a  duty  under  extraordinary  circumstances. 
And  these  seemingly  opposed  convictions  were  not 
really  inconsistent.  So  long  as  rule  followed  prece 
dent, —  so  long  as  its  commands,  however  harsh, 
did  not  conflict  with  sentiment  and  tradition,  —  tha*. 
rule  was  regarded  as  religious,  and  there  was  abso 
lute  submission.  But  when  rulers  presumed  to 
break  with  ethical  usage,  —  in  a  spirit  of  reckless 
cruelty  or  greed,  —  then  the  people  might  feel  it  a 
religious  obligation  to  resist  with  all  the  zeal  of  vol 
untary  martyrdom.  The  danger-line  for  every  form 
of  local  tyranny  was  departure  from  precedent.  Even 
the  conduct  of  regents  and  princes  was  much  re 
strained  by  the  common  opinion  of  their  retainers, 
and  by  the  knowledge  that  certain  kinds  of  arbitrary 
conduct  were  likely  to  provoke  assassination. 

Deference  to  the  sentiment  of  vassals  and  retainers 
was  from  ancient  time  a  necessary  policy  with  Japan 
ese  rulers,  —  not  merely  because  of  the  peril  involved 


436  MODERN    RESTRAINTS 

by  needless  oppression,  but  much  more  because  of 
the  recognition  that  duties  are  well  performed  only 
when  subordinates  feel  assured  that  their  efforts  will 
be  fairly  considered,  and  that  sudden  needless  changes 
will  not  be  made  to  their  disadvantage.  This  old 
policy  still  characterizes  Japanese  administration ; 
and  the  deference  of  high  authority  to  collective 
opinion  astonishes  and  puzzles  the  foreign  observer. 
He  perceives  only  that  the  conservative  power  of 
sentiment,  as  exercised  by  groups  of  subordinates, 
remains  successfully  opposed  to  those  conditions  of 
discipline  which  we  think  indispensable  to  social 
progress.  Just  as  in  Old  Japan  the  ruler  of  a  dis 
trict  was  held  responsible  for  the  behaviour  of  his 
subjects,  so  to-day,  in  New  Japan,  every  official  in 
charge  of  a  department  is  held  responsible  for  the 
smooth  working  of  its  routine.  But  this  does  not 
mean  that  he  is  responsible  only  for  the  efficiency 
of  a  service :  it  means  that  he  is  held  responsible 
likewise  for  failure  to  satisfy  the  wishes  of  his  sub 
ordinates,  or  at  least  the  majority  of  his  subordi 
nates.  If  this  majority  be  displeased  with  their 
minister,  governor,  president,  manager,  chief,  or 
director,  the  fact  is  considered  proof  of  administra 
tive  incompetency.  .  .  .  Perhaps  educational  circles 
afford  the  most  curious  examples  of  this  old  idea  of 
responsibility.  A  student-revolt  is  commonly  sup 
posed  to  mean,  not  that  the  students  are  intractable, 
but  that  the  superintendent  or  teacher  does  not  know 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  437 

his  business.  Thus  the  principal  of  a  college,  the 
director  of  a  school,  holds  his  office  only  on  the 
condition  that  his  rule  gives  satisfaction  to  a  ma 
jority  of  the  students.  In  the  higher  government 
institutions,  each  professor  or  lecturer  is  made  re 
sponsible  for  the  success  of  his  lectures.  No  matter 
how  great  may  be  his  ability  in  other  directions,  the 
official  instructor,  unable  to  make  himself  liked  by 
his  pupils,  will  be  got  rid  of  in  short  order  —  unless 
some  powerful  protectors  interfere  on  his  behalf.  The 
efforts  of  the  man  will  never  be  judged  (officially)  by 
any  accepted  standard  of  excellence,  —  never  esti 
mated  by  their  intrinsic  worth ;  they  will  be  con 
sidered  only  according  to  their  direct  effect  upon  the 
average  of  minds.1  Almost  everywhere  this  antique 
system  of  responsibility  is  maintained.  A  minister 
of  state  is  by  public  sentiment  made  responsible  not 
only  for  the  results  of  his  administration,  but  like 
wise  for  any  scandals  or  troubles  that  may  occur  in 
his  department,  independently  of  the  question  whether 
he  could  or  could  not  have  prevented  them.  To  a 
considerable  degree,  therefore,  it  is  true  that  the  ulti- 

1  Unjust  as  this  policy  must  appear  to  the  Western  reader  (a  policy  which  cer 
tainly  presupposes  ethical  conditions  very  different  from  our  own),  it  was  probably  at 
one  time  the  best  possible  under  the  new  order.  Considering  the  extraordinary  changes 
suddenly  made  in  the  educational  system,  it  will  be  obvious  that  a  teacher's  immedi 
ate  value  was  likely  —  twenty  years  ago  —  to  depend  on  his  ability  to  make  his  teach 
ing  attractive.  If  he  attempted  to  teach  either  above  or  below  the  average  capacity 
of  his  pupils,  or  if  he  made  his  instruction  unpalatable  to  minds  greedy  for  new  know 
ledge,  but  innocent  as  to  method,  his  inexperience  could  be  corrected  by  the  will  of 
his  class. 


438  MODERN   RESTRAINTS 

mate  power  is  below.  The  highest  official  is  not 
able  with  impunity  to  impose  his  personal  will  in 
certain  directions ;  and,  for  the  time  being,  it  is 
probably  better  that  his  powers  are  thus  restrained. 
From  above  downwards  through  all  the  grades  of 
society,  the  same  system  of  responsibility,  and  the 
same  restraints  upon  individual  exercise  of  will,  per 
sist  under  varying  forms.  The  conditions  within 
the  household  differ  but  little  in  this  regard  from  the 
conditions  in  a  government  department :  no  house 
holder,  for  example,  can  impose  his  will,  beyond 
certain  fixed  limits,  even  upon  his  own  servants  or 
dependents.  Neither  for  love  nor  money  can  a 
good  servant  be  induced  to  break  with  traditional 
custom  ;  and  the  old  opinion,  that  the  value  of  a 
servant  is  proved  by  such  inflexibility,  has  been 
justified  by  the  experience  of  centuries.  Popular 
sentiment  remains  conservative ;  and  the  apparent 
zeal  for  superficial  innovation  affords  no  indication  of 
the  real  order  of  existence.  Fashions  and  formal 
ities,  house-interiors  and  street-vistas,  habits  and 
methods,  and  all  the  outer  aspects  of  life  are  changed  ; 
but  the  old  regimentation  of  society  persists  under 
all  these  surface-shiftings  ;  and  the  national  character 
remains  little  affected  by  all  the  transformations  of 
Meiji. 

The  second  kind  of  coercion  to  which  the  individ 
ual  is  subjected — the  communal,  or  communistic  — 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  439 

seems  likely  to  prove  mischievous  in  the  near  future, 
as  it  signifies  practical  suppression  of  the  right  to  com 
pete.  .  .  .  The  everyday  life  of  any  Japanese  city 
offers  numberless  suggestions  of  the  manner  in  which 
the  masses  continue  to  think  and  to  act  by  groups. 
But  no  more  familiar  and  forcible  illustration  of  the 
fact  can  be  cited  than  that  which  is  furnished  by  the 
code  of  the  kurumaya  or  jinrikisha-men.  According 
to  its  terms,  one  runner  must  not  attempt  to  pass  by 
another  going  in  the  same  direction.  Exceptions 
have  been  made,  grudgingly,  in  favour  of  runners  in 
private  employ,  —  men  selected  for  strength  and 
speed,  who  are  expected  to  use  their  physical  powers 
to  the  utmost.  But  among  the  tens  of  thousands  of 
public  kurumaya^  it  is  the  rule  that  a  young  and 
active  man  must  not  pass  by  an  old  and  feeble  man, 
nor  even  by  a  needlessly  slow  and  lazy  man.  To 
take  advantage  of  one's  own  superior  energy,  so  as 
to  force  competition,  is  an  offence  against  the  calling, 
and  certain  to  be  resented.  You  engage  a  good 
runner,  whom  you  order  to  make  all  speed :  he 
springs  away  splendidly,  and  keeps  up  the  pace 
until  he  happens  to  overtake  some  weak  or  lazy 
puller,  who  seems  to  be  moving  as  slowly  as  the 
gait  permits.  Therewith,  instead  of  bounding  by, 
your  man  drops  immediately  behind  the  slow-going 
vehicle,  and  slackens  his  pace  almost  to  a  walk. 
For  half  an  hour,  or  more,  you  may  be  thus  delayed 
by  the  regulation  which  obliges  the  strong  and 


440  MODERN   RESTRAINTS 

swift  to  wait  for  the  weak  and  slow.  An  angry 
appeal  is  made  to  the  runner  who  dares  to  pass 
another;  and  the  idea  behind  the  words  might  be 
thus  expressed :  "  You  know  that  you  are  break 
ing  the  rule,  —  that  you  are  acting  to  the  disadvan 
tage  of  your  comrades  !  This  is  a  hard  calling ;  and 
our  lives  would  be  made  harder  than  they  are,  if 
there  were  no  rules  to  prevent  selfish  competition  !  " 
Of  course  there  is  no  thought  of  the  consequences 
of  such  rules  to  business  interests  at  large.  .  .  . 
Now  it  is  not  unjust  to  say  that  this  moral  code  of 
the  kurumaya  exemplifies  an  unwritten  law  which 
has  been  always  imposed,  in  varying  forms,  upon 
every  class  of  workers  in  Japan  :  "  You  must  not 
try,  without  special  authorization,  to  pass  your  fel 
lows."  .  .  .  La  carrier e  est  ouverte  aux  talents  — 
mats  la  concurrence  est  def endue  ! 

Of  course  the  modern  communal  restraint  upon 
free  competition  represents  the  survival  and  exten 
sion  of  that  altruistic  spirit  which  ruled  the  ancient 
society,  —  not  the  mere  continuance  of  any  fixed 
custom.  In  feudal  times  there  were  no  kurumaya; 
but  all  craftsmen  and  all  labourers  formed  guilds  or 
companies ;  and  the  discipline  maintained  by  those 
guilds  or  companies  prohibited  competition  as  under 
taken  for  merely  personal  advantage.  Similar  or 
nearly  similar  forms  of  organization  are  maintained 
by  artizans  and  labourers  to-day ;  and  the  relation 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  441 

of  any  outside  employer  to  skilled  labour  is  regu 
lated,  by  the  guild  or  company,  in  the  old  commu 
nistic  manner.  .  .  .  Let  us  suppose,  for  instance, 
that  you  wish  to  have  a  good  house  built.  For  that 
undertaking,  you  will  have  to  deal  with  a  very  intel 
ligent  class  of  skilled  labour  ;  for  the  Japanese  house- 
carpenter  may  be  ranked  with  the  artist  almost  as 
much  as  with  the  artizan.  You  may  apply  to  a 
building-company ;  but,  as  a  general  rule,  you  will 
do  better  by  applying  to  a  master-carpenter,  who 
combines  in  himself  the  functions  of  architect,  con 
tractor,  and  builder.  In  any  event  you  cannot  select 
and  hire  workmen :  guild-regulations  forbid.  You 
can  only  make  your  contract;  and  the  master-car 
penter,  when  his  plans  have  been  approved,  will 
undertake  all  the  rest,  —  purchase  and  transport 
of  material,  —  hire  of  carpenters,  plasterers,  tilers, 
mat-makers,  screen-fitters,  brass-workers,  stone-cut 
ters,  locksmiths,  and  glaziers.  For  each  master- 
carpenter  represents  much  more  than  his  own 
craft-guild :  he  has  his  clients  in  every  trade  re 
lated  to  house-building  and  house-furnishing;  and 
you  must  not  dream  of  trying  to  interfere  with  his 
claims  and  privileges.  ...  He  builds  your  house 
according  to  contract ;  but  that  is  only  the  begin 
ning  of  the  relation.  You  have  really  made  with 
him  an  agreement  which  you  must  not  break,  with 
out  good  and  sufficient  reason,  for  the  rest  of  your 
life.  Whatever  afterwards  may  happen  to  any  part 


442  MODERN    RESTRAINTS 

of  your  house,  —  walls,  floor,  ceiling,  roof,  founda 
tion,  —  you  must  arrange  for  repairs  with  him,  never 
with  anybody  else.  Should  the  roof  leak,  for  in 
stance,  you  must  not  send  for  the  nearest  tiler  or 
tinsmith  ;  if  the  plaster  cracks,  you  must  not  send 
for  a  plasterer.  The  man  who  built  your  house 
holds  himself  responsible  for  its  condition ;  and  he 
is  jealous  of  that  responsibility :  none  but  he  has 
the  right  to  send  for  the  plasterer,  the  roofer,  the 
tinsmith.  If  you  interfere  with  that  right,  you 
may  have  some  unpleasant  surprises.  If  you  make 
appeal  to  the  law  against  that  right,  you  will  find 
that  you  can  get  no  carpenter,  tiler,  or  plasterer  to 
work  for  you  at  any  terms.  Compromise  is  always 
possible ;  but  the  guilds  will  resent  a  needless  ap 
peal  to  the  law.  And  after  all,  these  craft-guilds 
are  usually  faithful  performers,  and  well  worth 
conciliating. 

Or  take  the  occupation  of  landscape-gardening. 
You  want  a  pretty  garden  ;  and  you  hire  a  profes 
sional  gardener  who  comes  to  you  well  recommended. 
He  makes  the  garden  ;  and  you  pay  his  price.  But 
your  gardener  really  represents  a  company ;  and  by 
engaging  him  it  is  understood  that  either  he,  or 
some  other  member  of  the  gardeners'  corporation  to 
which  he  belongs,  will  continue  to  take  care  of  your 
garden  as  long  as  you  own  it.  At  each  season  he 
will  pay  your  garden  a  visit,  and  put  everything  to 
rights :  he  will  clip  the  hedges,  prune  the  fruit  trees, 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  443 

repair  the  fences,  train  the  climbing-plants,  look 
after  the  flowers,  —  putting  up  paper  awnings  to 
protect  delicate  shrubs  from  the  sun  during  the 
hot  season,  or  making  little  tents  of  straw  to  shel 
ter  them  in  time  of  frost;  —  he  will  do  a  hundred 
useful  and  ingenious  things  for  a  very  small  remu 
neration.  You  cannot  dismiss  him,  however,  with 
out  good  reason,  and  hire  another  gardener  to  take 
his  place.  No  other  gardener  would  serve  you  at 
any  price,  unless  assured  that  the  original  relation 
had  been  dissolved  by  mutual  consent.  If  you 
have  just  cause  for  complaint,  the  matter  can  be 
settled  through  arbitration  ;  and  the  guild  will  see 
that  you  have  no  further  trouble.  But  you  cannot 
dismiss  your  gardener  without  cause,  merely  to  en 
gage  another. 

The  above  examples  will  suffice  to  show  the  char 
acter  of  the  old  communistic  organization  which  is 
yet  maintained  in  a  hundred  forms.  This  com 
munism  suppressed  competition,  except  as  between 
groups ;  but  it  insured  good  work,  and  secured  easy 
conditions  for  the  workman.  It  was  the  best  system 
possible  in  those  ages  of  isolation  when  there  was  no 
such  thing  as  want,  and  when  the  population,  for  yet 
undetermined  causes,  appears  to  have  remained  al 
ways  below  the  numerical  level  at  which  serious 
pressure  begins.  .  .  .  Another  interesting  sur 
vival  is  represented  by  existing  conditions  of  ap- 


444  MODERN   RESTRAINTS 

prenticeship  and  service,  —  conditions  which  also 
originated  in  the  patriarchal  organization,  and  im 
posed  other  kinds  of  restraint  upon  competition. 
Under  the  old  regime  service  was,  for  the  most 
part,  unsalaried.  Boys  taken  into  a  commercial 
house  to  learn  the  business,  or  apprentices  bound 
to  a  master-workman,  were  boarded,  lodged,  clothed, 
and  even  educated  by  their  patron,  with  whom  they 
might  hope  to  pass  the  rest  of  their  lives.  But  they 
were  not  paid  wages  until  they  had  learned  the  busi 
ness  or  the  trade  of  their  employer,  and  were  fully 
capable  of  managing  a  business  or  a  workshop  of 
their  own.  To  a  considerable  degree  these  condi 
tions  still  prevail  in  commercial  centres,  —  though 
the  merchant  or  patron  seldom  now  finds  it  neces 
sary  to  send  his  clerk,  or  apprentice  to  school. 
Many  of  the  great  commercial  houses  pay  salaries 
only  to  men  of  great  experience :  other  employes 
are  only  trained  and  cared  for  until  their  term  of 
service  ends,  when  the  most  clever  among  them  will 
be  reengaged  as  experts,  and  the  others  helped  to 
start  in  business  for  themselves.  In  like  manner 
the  apprentice  to  a  trade,  when  his  term  expires, 
may  be  reengaged  by  his  master  as  a  hired  journey 
man,  or  helped  to  find  permanent  employ  elsewhere. 
These  paternal  and  filial  relations  between  employer 
and  employed  have  helped  to  make  life  pleasant  and 
labour  cheerful ;  and  the  quality  of  all  industrial  pro 
duction  must  suffer  much  when  they  disappear. 


MODERN   RESTRAINTS  445 

Even  in  private  domestic  service  the  patriarchal 
system  still  prevails  to  a  degree  that  is  little  imag 
ined  ;  and  this  subject  deserves  more  than  a  pass 
ing  mention.  I  refer  especially  to  female  service. 
The  maid-servant,  according  to  the  old  custom,  is 
not  primarily  responsible  to  her  employers,  but  to 
her  own  family ;  and  the  terms  of  her  service  must 
be  arranged  with  her  family,  who  pledge  themselves 
for  their  daughter's  good  behaviour.  As  a  general 
rule,  a  nice  girl  does  not  seek  domestic  service  for 
the  sake  of  the  wages  (which  it  is  now  the  custom 
to  pay),  nor  for  the  sake  of  a  living,  but  chiefly  to 
prepare  herself  for  marriage ;  and  this  preparation 
is  desired  as  much  in  the  hope  of  doing  credit  to 
her  own  family,  as  in  the  hope  of  better  fitting  her 
self  for  membership  in  the  family  of  her  future  hus 
band.  The  best  servants  are  country  girls ;  and 
they  are  sometimes  put  out  to  service  very  young. 
Parents  are  careful  about  choosing  the  family  into 
which  their  daughter  thus  enters :  they  particularly 
desire  that  the  house  be  one  in  which  a  girl  can 
learn  nice  ways,  —  therefore  a  house  in  which  things 
are  ordered  according  to  the  old  etiquette.  A  good 
girl  expects  to  be  treated  rather  as  a  helper  than  as 
a  hireling,  —  to  be  kindly  considered,  and  trusted, 
and  liked.  In  an  old-fashioned  household  the  maid 
is  indeed  so  treated ;  and  the  relation  is  not  a  brief 
one  —  from  three  to  five  years  being  the  term  of 
service  usually  agreed  upon.  But  when  a  girl  is 


446  MODERN    RESTRAINTS 

taken  into  service  at  the  age  of  eleven  or  twelve, 
she  will  probably  remain  for  eight  or  ten  years. 
Besides  wages,  she  is  entitled  to  receive  from  her 
employers  the  gift  of  a  dress,  twice  every  year, 
besides  other  necessary  articles  of  clothing ;  and  she 
is  entitled  also  to  a  certain  number  of  holidays. 
Such  wages,  or  presents  in  money,  as  she  receives, 
should  enable  her  to  provide  herself,  by  degrees, 
with  a  good  wardrobe.  Except  in  the  event  of  some 
extraordinary  misfortune,  her  parents  will  make  no 
claim  upon  her  wages ;  but  she  remains  subject  to 
them  ;  and  when  she  is  called  home  to  be  married, 
she  must  go.  During  the  period  of  her  service, 
the  services  of  her  family  are  also  at  the  disposal 
of  her  employers.  Even  if  the  mistress  or  master 
desire  no  recognition  of  the  interest  taken  in  the 
girl,  some  recognition  will  certainly  be  made.  If 
the  servant  be  a  farmer's  daughter,  it  is  probable 
that  gifts  of  vegetables,  fruits,  or  fruit  trees,  garden- 
plants  or  other  country  products,  will  be  sent  to 
the  house  at  intervals  fixed  by  custom ;  —  if  the 
parents  belong  to  the  artizan-class,  it  is  likely  that 
some  creditable  example  of  handicraft  will  be  pre 
sented  as  a  token  of  gratitude.  The  gratitude  of 
the  parents  is  not  for  the  wages  or  the  dresses  given 
to  their  daughter,  but  for  the  practical  education 
she  receives,  and  for  the  moral  and  material  care 
taken  of  her,  as  a  temporarily  adopted  child  of  the 
house.  The  employers  may  reciprocate  such  atten- 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  447 

tions  on  the  part  of  the  parents  by  contributing  to 
the  girl's  wedding  outfit.  The  relation,  it  will  be 
observed,  is  entirely  between  families,  not  between 
individuals  ;  and  it  is  a  permanent  relation.  Such 
a  relation,  in  feudal  ages,  might  continue  through 
many  generations. 

The  patriarchal  conditions  which  these  survivals 
exemplify  helped  to  make  existence  easy  and  happy. 
Only  from  a  modern  point  of  view  is  it  possible  to 
criticise  them.  The  worst  that  can  be  said  about 
them  is  that  their  moral  value  was  chiefly  conserva 
tive,  and  that  they  tended  to  repress  effort  in  new 
directions.  But  where  they  still  endure,  Japanese  life 
keeps  something  of  its  ancient  charm ;  and  where  they 
have  disappeared,  that  charm  has  vanished  forever. 

There  remains  to  be  considered  a  third  form 
of  restraint,  —  that  exercised  upon  the  individual  by 
official  authority.  This  also  presents  us  with  vari 
ous  survivals,  which  have  their  bright  as  well  as  their 
dark  aspects. 

We  have  seen  that  the  individual  has  been  legally 
freed  from  most  of  the  obligations  imposed  by  the 
ancient  law.  He  is  no  longer  obliged  to  follow  a 
particular  occupation ;  he  is  able  to  travel ;  he  is  at 
liberty  to  marry  into  a  higher  or  a  lower  class  than 
his  own ;  he  is  not  even  forbidden  to  change  his 
religion  ;  he  can  do  a  great  many  things  —  at  his  own 


448  MODERN    RESTRAINTS 

risk.  But  where  the  law  leaves  him  free,  the  famil) 
and  the  community  do  not ;  and  the  persistence  of 
old  sentiment  and  custom  nullifies  many  of  the 
rights  legally  conferred.  Precisely  in  the  same  way, 
his  relations  to  higher  authority  are  still  controlled 
by  traditions  which  maintain,  in  despite  of  constitu 
tional  law,  many  of  the  ancient  restraints,  and  not 
a  little  of  the  ancient  coercion.  In  theory  any  man 
of  great  talent  and  energy  may  rise,  from  rank  to 
rank,  up  to  the  highest  positions.  But  as  private 
life  is  still  controlled  to  no  small  degree  by  the  old 
communism,  so  public  life  is  yet  controlled  by  survi 
vals  of  class  or  clan  despotism.  The  chances  for 
ability  to  rise  without  assistance,  to  win  its  way 
to  rank  and  power,  are  extraordinarily  small ;  since  to 
contend  alone  against  an  opposition  that  thinks  by 
groups,  and  acts  by  masses,  must  be  almost  hopeless. 
Only  commercial  or  industrial  life  now  offers  really 
fair  opportunities  to  capable  men.  The  few  talented 
persons  of  humble  origin  who  do  succeed  in  official 
directions  owe  their  success  chiefly  to  party-help  or 
clan-patronage  :  in  order  to  force  any  recognition  of 
personal  ability,  group  must  be  opposed  to  group, 
Alone,  no  man  is  likely  to  accomplish  anything  by 
mere  force  of  competition,  outside  of  trade  or  com 
merce.  ...  It  is  true,  of  course,  that  individual 
talent  must  in  every  country  encounter  many  forms 
of  opposition.  It  is  likewise  true  that  the  malevo 
lence  of  envy  and  the  brutalities  of  class-prejudice 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  449 

have  their  sociological  worth :  they  help  to  make  it 
impossible  for  any  but  the  most  gifted  to  win  and 
to  keep  success.  But  in  Japan  the  peculiar  consti 
tution  of  society  lends  excessive  power  to  social 
intrigues  directed  against  obscure  ability,  and  makes 
them  highly  injurious  to  the  interests  of  the  nation ; 
—  for  at  no  previous  time  in  her  history  has  Japan 
needed,  so  much  as  now,  the  best  capacities  of  her 
best  men,  irrespective  of  class  or  condition. 

But  all  this  was  inevitable  in  the  period  of  recon 
struction.  More  significant  is  the  fact  that  in  no 
single  department  of  its  multitudinous  service  does 
the  Government  yet  offer  substantial  reward  to  ris 
ing  merit.  No  matter  how  well  a  man  may  strive 
to  win  Government  approbation,  he  must  strive  for 
little  more  than  honour  and  the  bare  means  of  exist 
ence.  The  costliest  efforts  are  no  more  highly  paid 
in  proportion  to  their  worth  than  the  cheapest ;  the 
most  invaluable  services  are  scarcely  better  recog 
nized  than  those  most  easily  dispensed  with  or 
replaced.  (There  have  been  some  remarkable 
exceptions :  I  am  stating  only  the  general  rule.) 
By  extraordinary  energy,  patience,  and  cleverness, 
one  may  reach,  with  class-help,  some  position  which 
in  Europe  would  assure  comfort  as  well  as  honour ; 
but  the  emoluments  of  such  a  position  in  Japan  will 
scarcely  cover  the  actual  cost  of  living.  Whether 
in  the  army  or  in  the  navy,  in  the  departments  of 
justice,  of  education,  of  communications,  or  of 


2G 


450 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS 


home  affairs,  —  the  differences  in  remuneration  no 
where  represent  the  differences  in  capacity  and 
responsibility.  To  rise  from  grade  to  grade  sig 
nifies  pecuniarily  almost  nothing,  —  for  the  expenses 
of  each  higher  position  augment  out  of  all  propor 
tion  to  the  salaries  fixed  by  law.  The  general  rule 
has  been  to  exact  everywhere  the  greatest  possible 
amount  of  service  for  the  least  possible  amount  of 
pay.1  Any  one  unacquainted  with  the  social  his- 

1  Salaries  of  judges  range  from  £jo  to  ^500  per  annum,  — the  latter  figure 
representing  the  highest  possible  emoiument.  The  highest  salary  allowed  to  a  Japan 
ese  professor  in  the  imperial  universities  has  been  fixed  at  ^120.  The  wages  of 
employes  in  the  postal  departments  is  barely  sufficient  to  meet  the  cost  of  living. 
The  police  are  paid  from  £i  to  £i  los.  per  month,  according  to  locality;  and 
the  average  pay  of  school-teachers  is  yet  lower  (being  9  yen  50  sen,  or  about  195. 
per  month),  —  many  receiving  less  than  js.  a  month. 

Readers  may  be  interested  in  the  following  table  of  army-payments  (1904)  :  — 


MONTHLY    PAY 

ALLOWANCE 
FOR 
HOUSE-RENT 

TOTAL 

yen 

yen 

yen 

coo  (/50) 

25  :  oo 

C2C  :  oo 

111 

18  :  75 

•7CT  :  je 

Major-General     

263 

12  :  50 

275  :  50 

I  7Q 

10  :  oo 

189  :  oo 

146 

8  :yc 

I  54  :  75 

loa 

7  :  1O 

IOQ  :  ;o 

Captain  (ist  grade}               . 

70 

4*  7C. 

74.  :  ye. 

"       (2d  graded    . 

60 

4  !  75 

64  :  75 

Lieutenant  (ist  grade)    .... 

45 

4:00 

49:00 

«           (ad  grade)     .... 

34 

4  :  oo 

40  :  oo 

Second  Lieutenant     

30 

3  '5° 

33  =  5° 

When  these  rates  of  pay  were  fixed,  about  twenty  years  ago,  house-rent   was 
cheap  :   a  good  house  could  be  rented  anywhere  at  3  yen  or  4  yen  per  month.      To- 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  451 

tory  of  the  country  might  suppose  that  the  policy 
of  the  Government  toward  its  employes  consisted 
in  substituting  empty  honours  for  material  advan 
tages.  But  the  truth  is  that  the  Government  has 
simply  maintained,  under  modern  forms,  the  ancient 
feudal  condition  of  service,  —  service  in  exchange 
for  the  means  of  simple  but  honourable  living.  In 
feudal  times  the  farmer  was  expected  to  pay  all  that 
he  could  pay  for  the  right  to  exist;  the  artist  or 
artizan  was  expected  to  content  himself  with  the 
good  fortune  of  having  a  distinguished  patron ; 
even  the  ordinary  samurai  were  supplied  with  barely 
more  than  the  necessary  by  their  liege-lords.  To 
receive  considerably  more  than  the  necessary  signi 
fied  extraordinary  favour ;  and  the  gift  was  usually 
accompanied  by  promotion.  But  although  the  same 
policy  is  yet  successfully  maintained  by  Government, 
under  the  modern  system  of  money-payments,  the 
conditions  everywhere,  outside  of  commercial  life, 
are  incomparably  harder  than  in  feudal  times.  Then 
the  poorest  samurai  was  secured  against  want,  and 
not  liable  to  be  dismissed  from  his  post  without 
fault.  Then  the  teacher  received  no  salary ;  but 
the  respect  of  the  community  and  the  gratitude 
of  his  pupils  assured  him  of  the  means  to  live  re- 
day  in  Tokyo  an  officer  can  scarcely  rent  even  a  very  small  house  at  less  than 
1 8  yen  or  ao  yen  ;  and  prices  of  food-stuffs  have  tripled.  Yet  there  have  been  very 
few  complaints.  Officers  whose  pay  will  not  allow  them  to  rent  houses  hire  roorm 
wherever  they  can.  Many  suffer  hardship  ;  but  all  are  proud  of  the  privilege  of 
verving,  and  no  one  dreams  of  resigning. 


45*  MODERN    RESTRAINTS 

spectably.  Then  the  artizans  were  patronized  by 
great  lords  who  vied  with  each  other  in  the  encour 
agement  of  humble  genius.  They  might  expect  the 
genius  to  be  satisfied  with  merely  nominal  payment, 
so  far  as  money  was  concerned ;  but  they  secured 
him  against  want  or  discomfort,  allowed  him  ample 
leisure  to  perfect  his  work,  made  him  happy  in  the 
certainty  that  his  best  would  be  prized  and  praised. 
But  now  that  the  cost  of  living  has  tripled  or  quad 
rupled,  even  the  artist  and  the  artizan  have  small 
encouragement  to  do  their  best :  cheap  rapid  work 
is  replacing  the  beautiful  leisurely  work  of  the  old 
days;  and  the  best  traditions  of  the  crafts  are  doomed 
to  perish.  It  cannot  even  be  said  that  the  state  of 
the  agricultural  classes  to-day  is  happier  or  better 
than  in  the  time  when  a  farmer's  land  could  not 
legally  be  taken  from  him0  And  as  the  cost  of  life 
continues  always  to  increase,  it  is  evident  that  at  no 
distant  time,  the  present  patient  order  of  things  will 
become  impossible. 

To  many  it  would  seem  that  a  wise  government 
must  recognize  the  impracticability  of-  indefinitely 
maintaining  its  present  demand  for  self-sacrifice,  — 
must  perceive  the  necessity  of  encouraging  talent, 
inviting  fair  competition,  and  making  the  prizes  of 
life  large  enough  to  stimulate  healthy  egoism.  But 
it  is  possible  that  the  Government  has  been  acting 
more  wisely  than  outward  appearances  would  indi 
cate.  Several  years  ago  a  Japanese  official  made  in 


MODERN   RESTRAINTS  453 

my  presence  this  curious  observation :  "  Our  Gov 
ernment  does  not  wish  to  encourage  competition 
beyond  the  necessary.  The  people  are  not  prepared 
for  it ;  and  if  it  were  strongly  encouraged,  the  worst 
side  of  character  would  come  to  the  surface."  How 
far  this  statement  really  expressed  any  policy  I  do 
not  know.  But  every  one  is  aware  that  free  com 
petition  can  be  made  as  cruel  and  as  pitiless  as  war,  — 
though  we  are  apt  to  forget  what  experience  must 
have  been  undergone  before  Occidental  free  com 
petition  could  become  as  comparatively  merciful  as  it 
is.  Among  a  people  trained  for  centuries  to  regard 
all  selfish  competition  as  criminal,  and  all  profit- 
seeking  despicable,  any  sudden  stimulation  of  effort 
for  purely  personal  advantage  might  well  be  im 
politic.  Evidence  as  to  how  little  the  nation  was 
prepared,  twelve  or  thirteen  years  ago,  for  Western 
forms  of  free  government,  has  been  furnished  by  the 
history  of  the  earlier  district-elections  and  of  the  first 
parliamentary  sessions.  There  was  really  no  per 
sonal  enmity  in  those  furious  election-contests,  which 
cost  so  many  lives ;  there  was  scarcely  any  per 
sonal  antagonism  in  those  parliamentary  debates  of 
which  the  violence  astonished  strangers.  The  po 
litical  struggles  were  not  really  between  individuals, 
but  between  clan-interests,  or  party-interests ;  and 
the  devoted  followers  of  each  clan  or  party  under 
stood  the  new  politics  only  as  a  new  kind  of  war, — 
a  war  of  loyalty  to  be  fought  for  the  leader's  sake,  — 


454  MODERN    RESTRAINTS 

a  war  not  to  be  interfered  with  by  any  abstract 
notions  of  right  or  justice.  Suppose  that  a  people 
have  been  always  accustomed  to  think  of  loyalty  in 
relation  to  persons  rather  than  to  principles,  —  loy 
alty  as  involving  the  duty  of  self-sacrifice  regardless 
of  consequence,  —  it  is  obvious  that  the  first  experi 
ments  of  such  a  people  with  parliamentary  govern 
ment  will  not  reveal  any  comprehension  of  fair  play 
in  the  Western  sense.  Eventually  that  comprehen 
sion  may  come  ;  but  it  will  not  come  quickly.  And 
if  you  can  persuade  such  a  people  that  in  other 
matters  every  man  has  a  right  to  act  according  to 
his  own  convictions,  and  for  his  own  advantage, 
independently  of  any  group  to  which  he  may  belong, 
the  immediate  result  will  not  be  fortunate,  —  be 
cause  the  sense  of  individual  moral  responsibility 
has  not  yet  been  sufficiently  cultivated  outside  of 
the  group-relation. 

The  probable  truth  is  that  the  strength  of  the 
government  up  to  the  present  time  has  been  chiefly 
due  to  the  conservation  of  ancient  methods,  and  to 
the  survival  of  the  ancient  spirit  of  reverential  sub 
mission.  Later  on,  no  doubt,  great  changes  will 
have  to  be  made;  meanwhile,  much  must  be  bravely 
endured .  Perhaps  the  future  history  of  modern 
civilization  will  hold  record  of  nothing  more  touch 
ing  than  the  patient  heroism  of  those  myriads  of 
Japanese  patriots,  content  to  accept,  under  legal 


MODERN    RESTRAINTS  455 

conditions  of  freedom,  the  official  servitude  of  feudal 
days,  —  satisfied  to  give  their  talent,  their  strength, 
their  utmost  effort,  their  lives,  for  the  simple  privi 
lege  of  obeying  a  government  that  still  accepts  all 
sacrifices  in  the  feudal  spirit  —  as  a  matter  of  course, 
—  as  a  national  duty,  And  as  a  national  duty,  in 
deed,  the  sacrifices  are  made.  All  know  that  Japan 
is  in  danger,  between  the  terrible  friendship  of 
England  and  the  terrible  enmity  of  Russia,  —  that 
she  is  poor,  —  that  the  cost  of  maintaining  her  arma 
ments  is  straining  her  resources,  —  that  it  is  every 
body's  duty  to  be  content  with  as  little  as  possible. 
So  the  complaints  are  not  many.  .  .  .  Nor  has  the 
simple  obedience  of  the  nation  at  large  been  less 
touching,  —  especially,  perhaps,  as  regards  the  im 
perial  order  to  acquire  Western  knowledge,  to  learn 
Western  languages,  to  imitate  Western  ways.  Only 
those  who  have  lived  in  Japan  during  or  before  the 
early  nineties  are  qualified  to  speak  of  the  loyal 
eagerness  that  made  self-destruction  by  over-study 
a  common  form  of  death,  —  the  passionate  obedi 
ence  that  impelled  even  children  to  ruin  their  health 
in  the  effort  to  master  tasks  too  difficult  for  their 
little  minds  (tasks  devised  by  well-meaning  advisers 
with  no  knowledge  of  Far-Eastern  psychology), — 
and  the  strange  courage  of  persistence  in  periods  of 
earthquake  and  conflagration,  when  boys  and  girls 
used  the  tiles  of  their  ruined  homes  for  school-slates, 
and  bits  of  fallen  plaster  for  pencils.  What  trage- 


456  MODERN   RESTRAINTS 

dies  I  might  relate  even  of  the  higher  educational 
life  of  universities  !  —  of  fine  brains  giving  way 
under  pressure  of  work  beyond  the  capacity  of  the 
average  European  student,  —  of  triumphs  won  in 
the  teeth  of  death,  —  of  strange  farewells  from 
pupils  in  the  time  of  the  dreaded  examinations,  as 
when  one  said  to  me :  "  Sir,  I  am  very  much  afraid 
that  my  paper  is  bad,  because  I  came  out  of  the 
hospital  to  make  it  —  there  is  something  the  matter 
with  my  heart."  (His  diploma  was  placed  in  his 
hands  scarcely  an  hour  before  he  died.)  .  .  .  And 
all  this  striving  —  striving  not  only  against  difficul 
ties  of  study,  but  in  most  cases  against  difficulties 
of  poverty,  and  underfeeding,  and  discomfort  — 
has  been  only  for  duty,  and  the  means  to  live.  To 
estimate  the  Japanese  student  by  his  errors,  his  fail 
ures,  his  incapacity  to  comprehend  sentiments  and 
ideas  alien  to  the  experience  of  his  race,  is  the  mis 
take  of  the  shallow  :  to  judge  him  rightly  one  must 
have  learned  to  know  the  silent  moral  heroism  of 
which  he  is  capable. 


Official    Education 


Official   Education 

THE  extent  to  which  national  character  has 
been  fixed  by  the  discipline  of  centuries,  and 
the  extent  of  its  extraordinary  capacity  to 
resist  change,  is  perhaps  most  strikingly  indicated 
by  certain  results  of  State  education.  The  whole 
nation  is  being  educated,  with  Government  help, 
upon  a  European  plan ;  and  the  full  programme 
includes  the  chief  subjects  of  Western  study,  except 
ing  Greek  and  Latin  classics.  From  Kindergarten 
to  University  the  entire  system  is  modern  in  out 
ward  seeming ;  yet  the  effect  of  the  new  education 
is  much  less  marked  in  thought  and  sentiment  than 
might  be  supposed.  This  fact  is  not  to  be  explained 
merely  by  the  large  place  which  old  Chinese  study 
still  occupies  in  the  obligatory  programme,  nor  by 
differences  of  belief:  it  is  much  more  due  to  the 
fundamental  difference  in  the  Japanese  and  the 
European  conceptions  of  education  as  means  to  an 
end.  In  spite  of  new  system  and  programme  the 
whole  of  Japanese  education  is  still  conducted  upon 
a  traditional  plan  almost  the  exact  opposite  of  the 
Western  plan.  With  us,  the  repressive  part  of 
moral  training  begins  in  early  childhood :  the  Euro 
pean  or  American  teacher  is  strict  with  the  little 

459 


460  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

ones ;  we  think  that  it  is  important  to  inculcate 
the  duties  of  behaviour,  —  the  "must"  and  the 
"must  not"  of  individual  obligation, — as  soon  as 
possible.  Later  on,  more  liberty  is  allowed.  The 
well-grown  boy  is  made  to  understand  that  his 
future  will  depend  upon  his  personal  effort  and  ca 
pacity  ;  and  he  is  thereafter  left,  in  a  great  measure,  to 
take  care  of  himself,  being  occasionally  admonished 
or  warned,  as  seems  needful.  Finally,  the  adult 
student  of  promise  and  character  may  become  the 
intimate,  or,  under  happy  circumstances,  even  the 
friend  of  his  tutor,  to  whom  he  can  look  for  counsel 
in  all  difficult  situations.  And  throughout  the  whole 
course  of  mental  and  moral  training  competition  is 
not  only  expected,  but  required.  But  it  is  more  and 
more  required  as  discipline  is  more  and  more  relaxed, 
with  the  passing  of  boyhood  into  manhood.  The 
aim  of  Western  education  is  the  cultivation  of  in 
dividual  ability  and  personal  character,  —  the  creation 
of  an  independent  and  forceful  being. 

Now  Japanese  education  has  always  been  con 
ducted,  and,  in  spite  of  superficial  appearances,  is 
still  being  conducted,  mostly  upon  the  reverse  plan. 
Its  object  never  has  been  to  train  the  individual  for 
independent  action,  but  to  train  him  for  cooperative 
action,  —  to  fit  him  to  occupy  an  exact  place  in  the 
mechanism  of  a  rigid  society.  Constraint  among 
ourselves  begins  with  childhood,  and  gradually  re 
laxes  ;  constraint  in  Far-Eastern  training  begins  later, 


OFFICIAL   EDUCATION  461 

and  thereafter  gradually  tightens ;  and  it  is  not  a 
constraint  imposed  directly  by  parents  or  teachers  — 
which  fact,  as  we  shall  presently  see,  makes  an  enor 
mous  difference  in  results.  Not  merely  up  to  the 
age  of  school-life,  —  supposed  to  begin  at  six  years, 

—  but  considerably  beyond  it,  a  Japanese  child  en 
joys  a  degree  of  liberty  far  greater  than  is  allowed 
to  Occidental  children.      Exceptional  cases  are  com 
mon,  of  course ;  but   the   general   rule   is   that  the 
child   be   permitted  to  do  as  he  pleases,  providing 
that  his  conduct  can  cause  no  injury  to  himself  or 
to   others.      He    is   guarded,  but    not    constrained; 
admonished,  but  rarely  compelled.      In  short,  he  is 
allowed   to    be    so   mischievous  that,  as  a  Japanese 
proverb  says,  "  even  the  holes  by  the  roadside  hate 
a  boy  of  seven  or  eight  years  old"1  (Nanatsu, yatsu 

—  michibata  no  ana  desaimon  nikumu).    Punishment  is 
administered  only  when  absolutely  necessary ;   and 
on    such   occasions,   by  ancient   custom,   the   entire 
household  —  servants    and    all  —  intercede    for    the 
offender ;  the  little  brothers  and  sisters,  if  any  there 
be,   begging    in    turn    to    bear  the  penalty  instead. 
Whipping    is    not    a   common    punishment,   except 
among  the  roughest  classes ;  the  moxa  is  preferred 
as  a  deterrent ;  and  it  is  a  severe  one.     To  frighten 
a  child  by  loud  harsh  words,  or  angry  looks,  is  con 
demned  by  general  opinion  :  all  punishment  ought 

1  By  former  custom  a  newly-born  child  was  said  to  be  one  year  old  ;  and  in  this 
case  the  words  "  seven  or  eight  years  old  "  mean  "  six  or  seven  years  old." 


462  OFFICIAL    EDUCATION 

to  be  inflicted  as  quietly  as  possible,  the  punisher 
calmly  admonishing  the  while.  To  slap  a  child 
about  the  head,  for  any  reason,  is  a  proof  of  vulgarity 
and  ignorance.  It  is  not  customary  to  punish  by 
restraining  from  play,  or  by  a  change  of  diet,  or  by 
any  denial  of  accustomed  pleasures.  To  be  perfectly 
patient  with  children  is  the  ethical  law.  At  school 
the  discipline  begins ;  but  it  is  at  first  so  very  light 
that  it  can  hardly  be  called  discipline :  the  teacher 
does  not  act  as  a  master,  but  rather  as  an  elder 
brother ;  and  there  is  no  punishment  beyond  a  pub 
lic  admonition.  Whatever  restraint  exists  is  chiefly 
exerted  on  the  child  by  the  common  opinion  of  his 
class  ;  and  a  skilful  teacher  is  able  to  direct  that 
opinion.  Also  each  class  is  nominally  governed  by 
one  or  two  little  captains,  selected  for  character  and 
intelligence ;  and  when  a  disagreeable  order  has  to 
be  given,  it  is  the  child-captain,  the  kyucho,  who  is 
commissioned  with  the  duty  of  giving  it.  (These 
little  details  are  worthy  of  note :  I  cite  them  only 
to  show  how  early  in  school-life  begins  the  discipline 
of  opinion,  the  pressure  of  the  common  will,  and 
how  perfectly  this  policy  accords  with  the  ethical 
traditions  of  the  race.)  In  higher  classes  the  press 
ure  slightly  increases ;  and  in  higher  schools  it  is 
very  much  stronger ;  the  ruling  power  always  being 
class-sentiment,  not  the  individual  will  of  the  teacher. 
In  middle  schools  the  pupils  become  serious :  class- 
opinion  there  attains  a  force  to  which  the  teacher 


OFFICIAL   EDUCATION  463 

himself  must  bend,  as  it  is  quite  capable  of  expelling 
him  for  any  attempt  to  override  it.  Each  middle- 
school  class  has  its  elected  officers,  who  represent 
and  enforce  the  moral  code  of  the  majority,  —  the 
traditional  standard  of  conduct.  (This  moral  stand 
ard  is  deteriorating ;  but  it  survives  everywhere  to 
some  degree.)  Fighting  or  bullying  are  yet  unknown 
in  Japanese  schools  of  this  grade  for  obvious  reasons  : 
there  can  be  little  indulgence  of  personal  anger,  and 
no  attempt  at  personal  domination,  under  a  disci 
pline  enforcing  a  uniform  manner  of  behaviour.  It 
is  never  the  domination  of  the  one  over  the  many 
that  regulates  class-life  :  it  is  always  the  rule  of  the 
many  over  the  one,  —  and  the  power  is  formidable. 
The  student  who  consciously  or  unconsciously  of 
fends  class-sentiment  will  suddenly  find  himself  iso 
lated, —  condemned  to  absolute  solitude.  No  one 
will  speak  to  him  or  notice  him  even  outside  of  the 
school,  until  such  time  as  he  decides  to  make  a  pub 
lic  apology,  when  his  pardon  will  depend  upon  a 
majority- vote. 

Such  temporary  ostracism  is  not  unreasonably 
feared,  because  it  is  regarded  even  outside  of  student- 
circles  as  a  disgrace  ;  and  the  memory  of  it  will  cling 
to  the  offender  during  the  rest  of  his  career.  How 
ever  high  he  may  rise  in  official  or  professional  life 
in  after  years,  the  fact  that  he  was  once  condemned 
by  the  general  opinion  of  his  schoolmates  will  not 
be  forgotten,  —  though  circumstances  may  occur 


464  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

which  will  turn  the  fact  to  his  credit.  ...  In  the 
great  Government  schools  —  to  one  of  which  the 
student  may  proceed  after  graduating  from  a  middle- 
school —  class-discipline  is  still  more  severe.  The 
instructors  are  mostly  officials  looking  for  promotion: 
the  students  are  grown  men,  preparing  for  the  Uni 
versity,  and  destined,  with  few  exceptions,  for  public 
office.  In  this  quietly  and  coldly  ordered  world 
there  is  little  place  for  the  joy  of  youth,  and  small 
opportunity  for  sympathetic  expansion.  There  are 
gatherings  and  societies ;  but  these  are  arranged  or 
established  for  practical  purposes  —  chiefly  in  rela 
tion  to  particular  branches  of  study ;  there  is  little 
time  for  merry-making,  and  less  inclination.  Under 
all  circumstances,  a  certain  formal  demeanour  is  ex 
acted  by  tradition,  —  a  tradition  older  by  far  than 
any  public  school.  Everybody  watches  everybody : 
eccentricities  or  singularities  are  quickly  marked  and 
quietly  suppressed.  The  results  of  this  class-disci 
pline,  as  maintained  in  some  institutions,  must  seem 
to  the  foreign  observer  discomforting.  What  most 
impressed  me  about  these  higher  official  schools  was 
the  sinister  silence  of  them.  In  one  where  I  taught 
for  several  years  —  the  most  conservative  school  in 
the  country  —  there  were  more  than  a  thousand 
young  men,  full  of  life  and  energy ;  yet  during  the 
intervals  between  classes,  or  during  recreation-hours 
in  the  playground,  the  garden,  and  the  gymnastic 
hall,  the  general  hush  gave  one  a  strange  sense  of 


OFFICIAL   EDUCATION  465 

oppression.  One  might  watch  a  game  of  foot-ball 
being  played,  and  hear  nothing  but  the  thud  of  the 
kicking ;  or  one  might  watch  wrestling-contests  in 
thejiujutsu-room,  and  hear  no  word  spoken  for  half 
an  hour  at  a  time.  (The  rules  ofjmjutsuy  it  is  true, 
require  not  only  silence,  but  the  total  suppression 
of  all  visible  emotional  interest  on  the  part  of  the 
spectators.)  All  this  repression  at  first  seemed  to 
me  very  strange  —  though  I  knew  that  thirty  years 
previously,  the  training  at  samurai-schools  compelled 
the  same  impassiveness  and  reticence. 

At  last  the  University  is  reached,  —  the  great 
gate  of  ceremony  to  public  office.  Here  the  student 
finds  himself  released  from  the  restraints  previously 
imposed  upon  his  private  life,1  though  the  class-will 
continues  to  rule  him  in  certain  directions.  As  a 
rule,  the  student  passes  into  official  life  after  having 
graduated,  marries,  and  becomes  the  head,  or  the 

1  This  release  is  of  recent  date  ;  and  the  results,  by  the  acknowledgment  of  the 
students  themselves,  have  not  been  good.  Twenty-five  years  ago,  University  study 
was  so  seriously  thought  about  that  a  scholar  who  failed,  through  his  own  fault, 
would  have  been  considered  a  criminal.  There  was  then  a  Chinese  poem  in  vogue, 
which  used  to  be  sung  at  the  departure  of  youths  for  the  University  of  that  time 
{Daigaku  Nanko}  by  their  friends  and  relations  :  — 

Danji  kokorozashi  wo  tatete,  kyokwan  wo  idzu ; 
Gaku  moshi  narazunba,  shisudomo  kaeradzu. 

[The  young  man,  having  made  a  firm  resolve,  leaves  bis  native  borne. 
If  be  fail  to  acquire  learning,  then,  even  though  be  die,  be  must  never  return.] 

In  those  years  also  it  was  obligatory  upon  students  to  live  and  dress  amply,  and  to 
abstain  from  all  self-indulgence. 
2H 


466  OFFICIAL    EDUCATION 

prospective  head,  of  a  household.  How  sudden  the 
transformation  of  the  man  at  this  epoch  of  his  career, 
only  those  who  have  observed  the  transformation 
can  imagine.  It  is  then  that  the  full  significance  of 
Japanese  education  reveals  itself. 

Few  incidents  of  Japanese  life  are  more  surprising 
than  the  metamorphosis  of  the  gawky  student  into 
the  dignified,  impassive,  easy-mannered  official. 
But  a  little  time  ago  he  was  respectfully  asking, 
cap  in  hand,  the  explanation  of  some  text,  the  mean 
ing  of  some  foreign  idiom  ;  to-day,  perhaps,  he  is 
judging  cases  in  some  court,  or  managing  diplo 
matic  correspondence  under  ministerial  supervision^ 
or  directing  the  management  of  some  public  school. 
Whatever  you  may  have  thought  of  his  particular 
capacity  as  a  student,  you  will  scarcely  doubt  his 
particular  fitness  for  the  position  to  which  he  has 
been  called.  Success  in  study  was  at  best  a  second 
ary  consideration  in  the  matter  of  his  appointment, 
—  though  he  had  to  succeed.  He  was  put  through 
some  special  course,  under  high  protection,  after 
having  been  selected  for  certain  qualities  of  char 
acter,  —  or  at  least  for  the  promise  of  such  qualities. 
There  may  have  been  favouritism  in  his  case ;  but, 
generally  speaking,  capable  men  are  appointed  to 
positions  of  trust :  the  Government  seldom  makes 
serious  mistakes.  This  man  has  value  beyond  what 
mere  study  could  make  for  him,  —  some  capacity  in 
the  direction  of  management  or  of  organization, — • 


OFFICIAL    EDUCATION  467 

some  natural  force  or  talent  which  his  training  has 
served  to  cultivate.  According  to  the  quality  of  his 
worth,  his  position  was  chosen  for  him  in  advance. 
His  long,  hard  schooling  has  taught  him  more  than 
books  can  teach,  and  more  than  a  stupid  person  can 
ever  learn  :  how  to  read  minds  and  motives,  —  how 
to  remain  impassive  under  all  circumstances,  —  how 
to  reach  a  truth  quickly  by  simple  questioning, — 
how  to  live  upon  his  guard  (even  against  the  most 
intimate  of  old  acquaintances),  —  how  to  remain, 
even  when  most  amiable,  secretive  and  inscrutable. 
He  has  graduated  in  the  art  of  worldly  wisdom. 
He  is  really  a  wonderful  person,  a  highly  developed 
type  of  his  race ;  and  no  inexperienced  Occidental 
is  capable  of  judging  him,  because  his  visible  acquire 
ments  count  for  very  little  in  the  measure  of  his 
relative  value.  His  University  study  —  his  Eng 
lish  or  French  or  German  knowledge  —  serves  him 
only  as  so  much  oil  to  make  easy  the  working  of 
certain  official  machinery:  he  esteems  this  learning 
only  as  means  to  some  administrative  end ;  his 
real  learning,  considerably  deeper,  represents  the 
development  of  the  Japanese  soul  of  him.  Between 
that  mind  and  any  Western  mind  the  distance  has 
become  immeasurable.  And  now,  less  than  ever 
before,  does  he  belong  to  himself.  He  belongs  to 
a  family,  to  a  party,  to  a  government :  privately  he 
is  bound  by  custom ;  publicly  he  must  act  accord 
ing  to  order  only,  and  never  dream  of  yielding  to 


468  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

any  impulses  at  variance  with  order,  however  gener 
ous  or  sensible  such  impulses  may  be.  A  word 
might  ruin  him  :  he  has  learned  to  use  no  words 
unnecessarily.  By  silent  submission  and  tireless 
observance  of  duty  he  may  rise,  and  rise  quickly  : 
he  may  become  Governor,  Chief  Justice,  Minister 
of  State,  Minister  Plenipotentiary ;  but  the  higher 
he  rises,  the  heavier  will  his  bonds  become. 

Long  training  in  caution  and  self-control  is  indeed 
an  indispensable  preparation  for  official  existence ; 
the  ability  either  to  keep  a  position  won,  or  to  resign 
it  with  honour,  depending  much  upon  such  training. 
The  most  sinister  circumstance  of  official  life  is  the 
absence  of  moral  freedom,  —  the  absence  of  the 
right  to  act  according  to  one's  own  convictions  of 
justice.  The  subordinate,  who  desires  above  all 
things  to  keep  his  place,  is  not  supposed  to  have 
personal  convictions  or  sympathies  —  save  by  per 
mission.  He  is  not  the  slave  of  a  man,  but  of  a 
system  —  a  system  as  old  as  China.  Were  human 
nature  perfect,  that  system  would  be  perfect ;  but  so 
long  as  human  nature  remains  what  it  is  now,  the 
system  leaves  much  to  be  desired.  Everything  may 
depend  upon  the  personal  character  of  those  tem 
porarily  intrusted  with  higher  power ;  and  the  only 
choice  left  for  the  most  capable  servant  under  a  bad 
master  may  be  to  resign  or  to  do  wrong.  The 
strong  man  faces  the  problem  bravely  and  resigns ; 
but  for  one  strong  man  there  are  fifty  timid  ones. 


OFFICIAL    EDUCATION  469 

Probably  the  prospect  of  a  broken  career  is  much 
less  terrifying  than  the  ancient  idea  of  crime  attach 
ing  to  any  form  of  insubordination.  As  the  forms 
of  a  religion  survive  after  the  faith  in  doctrine  has 
passed  away,  so  the  power  of  Government  to  coerce 
even  conscience  still  remains,  though  religion  is  no 
longer  identified  with  Government.  The  system  of 
secrecy,  implacably  enforced,  helps  to  maintain  the 
vague  awe  that  has  always  attached  to  the  idea 
of  administrative  authority  ;  and  such  authority  is 
practically  omnipotent  within  those  limits  which  I 
have  already  indicated.  To  be  favoured  by  au 
thority  means  to  experience  all  the  illusive  pleas 
ure  of  a  suddenly  created  popularity :  an  entire 
community,  a  whole  city,  is  made  by  a  word  to 
turn  all  the  amiable  side  of  its  human  nature 
toward  the  favourite,  —  to  charm  him  into  the 
belief  that  he  is  worthy  of  the  best  that  the  world 
can  give  him.  But  suppose  that  the  moving  powers 
happen,  latter  on,  to  find  the  favoured  man  in  the 
way  of  some  policy  —  lo !  at  another  whispered 
word  he  finds  himself,  without  knowing  why,  the 
public  enemy.  None  speak  to  him  or  salute  him  or 
smile  upon  him  —  save  ironically:  long-esteemed 
friends  pass  him  by  without  recognition,  or,  if  pur 
sued,  reply  to  his  most  earnest  questions  with  all 
possible  brevity  and  caution.  Most  likely  they  do 
not  know  the  "  why "  of  the  matter :  they  only 
know  that  orders  have  been  given,  and  that  into  the 


470  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

reason  of  orders  it  is  not  good  to  enquire.  Even 
the  street-children  know  this  much,  and  mock  the 
despondent  victim  of  fortune ;  even  the  dogs 
seem  instinctively  to  divine  the  change  and  bark  at 
him  as  he  passes  by.  .  .  .  Such  is  the  power  of 
official  displeasure ;  and  the  penalty  of  a  blunder 
or  a  breach  of  discipline  may  extend  considerably 

further but  in  feudal  times  the  offender  would 

have  been  simply  told  to  perform  harakiri.  Some 
times,  when  the  wrong  men  get  into  power,  the 
force  of  authority  may  be  used  for  malevolent  ends ; 
and  in  such  event  it  requires  not  a  little  courage  to 
disobey  an  order  to  act  against  conscience.  What 
saved  Japanese  society  in  former  ages  from  the 
worst  results  of  this  form  of  tyranny,  was  the  moral 
sentiment  of  the  mass,  —  the  common  feeling  that 
underlay  all  submission  to  authority,  and  remained 
always  capable,  if  pressed  upon  too  brutally,  of  com 
pelling  a  reaction.  Conditions  to-day  are  more 
favourable  to  justice ;  but  it  requires  much  tact, 
steadiness,  and  resolution  on  the  part  of  a  rising 
official  to  steer  himself  safely  among  the  reefs  and 
the  whirlpools  of  the  new  political  life. 

***** 

The  reader  will  now  be  able  to  understand  the 
general  character,  aim,  and  results  of  official  educa 
tion  as  a  system.  It  will  be  also  worth  while  to 
consider  in  detail  certain  phases  of  student-life  which 
equally  prove  the  survival  of  old  conditions  and  old 


OFFICIAL    EDUCATION  471 

traditions.  I  can  speak  about  these  matters  from 
personal  experience  as  a  teacher,  —  an  experience 
extending  over  nearly  thirteen  years. 

Readers  of  Goethe  will  remember  the  trustful 
docility  of  the  student  received  by  Doctor  Mephis- 
topheles  in  the  First  Part  of  Faust,  and  the  very 
different  demeanour  of  the  same  student  when  he 
reappears,  in  the  Second  Part,  as  Baccalaureus. 
More  than  one  foreign  professor  in  Japan  must 
have  been  reminded  of  that  contrast  by  personal 
experience,  and  must  have  wondered  whether  some 
one  of  the  early  educational  advisers  to  the  Japanese 
Government  did  not  play,  without  malice  prepense, 
the  very  role  of  Mephistopheles.  .  .  .  The  gentle 
boy  who,  with  innocent  reverence,  makes  his  visit 
of  courtesy  to  the  foreign  teacher,  bringing  for  gift 
a  cluster  of  iris-flowers  or  odorous  spray  of  plum- 
blossoms, —  the  boy  who  does  whatever  he  is  told, 
and  charms  by  an  earnestness,  a  trustfulness,  a  grace 
of  manner  rarely  met  with  among  Western  lads 
of  the  same  age,  —  is  destined  to  undergo  the 
strangest  of  transformations  long  before  becoming 
a  baccalaureus.  You  may  meet  with  him  a  few 
years  later,  in  the  uniform  of  some  Higher  School, 
and  find  it  difficult  to  recognize  your  former  pupil, 
—  now  graceless,  taciturn,  secretive,  and  inclined 
to  demand  as  a  right  what  could  scarcely,  with  pro 
priety,  be  requested  as  a  favour.  You  may  find 


472  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

him  patronizing, — possibly  something  worse.  Later 
on,  at  the  University,  he  becomes  more  formally  cor 
rect,  but  also  more  far  away, —  so  very  far  away  from 
his  boyhood  that  the  remoteness  is  a  pain  to  one 
who  remembers  that  boyhood.  The  Pacific  is  less 
wide  and  deep  than  the  invisible  gulf  now  extend 
ing  between  the  mind  of  the  stranger  and  the  mind 
of  the  student.  The  foreign  professor  is  now  re 
garded  merely  as  a  teaching-machine;  and  he  is 
more  than  likely  to  regret  any  effort  made  to  main 
tain  an  intimate  relation  with  his  pupils.  Indeed 
the  whole  formal  system  of  official  education  is 
opposed  to  the  development  of  any  such  relation. 
I  am  speaking  of  general  facts  in  this  connexion, 
not  of  merely  personal  experiences.  No  matter 
what  the  foreigner  may  do  in  the  hope  of  finding 
his  way  into  touch  with  the  emotional  life  of  his 
students,  or  in  the  hope  of  evoking  that  interest  in 
certain  studies  which  renders  possible  an  intellectual 
tie,  he  must  toil  in  vain.  Perhaps  in  two  or  three 
cases  out  of  a  thousand  he  may  obtain  something 
precious,  —  a  lasting  and  kindly  esteem,  based  upon 
moral  comprehension ;  but  should  he  wish  for  more 
he  must  remain  in  the  state  of  the  Antarctic  ex 
plorer,  seeking,  month  after  month,  to  no  purpose, 
some  inlet  through  endless  cliffs  of  everlasting  ice. 
Now  the  case  of  the  Japanese  professor  proves  the 
barrier  natural,  to  a  large  extent.  The  Japanese 
professor  can  ask  for  extraordinary  efforts  and 


OFFICIAL    EDUCATION  473 

obtain  them ;  he  can  afford  to  be  easily  familiar 
with  his  students  outside  of  class ;  and  he  can  get 
what  no  stranger  can  obtain,  —  their  devotion.  The 
difference  has  been  attributed  to  race-feeling ;  but  it 
cannot  be  so  easily  and  vaguely  explained. 

Something  of  race-sentiment  there  certainly  is ; 
it  were  impossible  that  there  should  not  be.  No 
inexperienced  foreigner  can  converse  for  one  half 
hour  with  any  Japanese  —  at  least  with  any  Japanese 
who  has  not  sojourned  abroad  —  and  avoid  saying 
something  that  jars  upon  Japanese  good  taste  or 
sentiment;  and  few  —  perhaps  none  —  among  un- 
travelled  Japanese  can  maintain  a  brief  conversation 
in  any  European  tongue  without  making  some 
startling  impression  upon  the  foreign  listener. 
Sympathethic  understanding,  between  minds  so 
differently  constructed,  is  next  to  impossible.  But 
the  foreign  professor  who  looks  for  the  impossible 
—  who  expects  from  his  Japanese  students  the  same 
quality  of  intelligent  comprehension  that  he  might 
reasonably  expect  from  Western  students  —  is  natu 
rally  disturbed.  "  Why  must  there  always  remain 
the  width  of  a  world  between  us  ?  "  is  a  question 
often  asked  and  rarely  answered. 

Some  of  the  reasons  should  by  this  time  be  ob 
vious  to  my  reader  ;  but  one  among  them  —  and  the 
most  curious  —  will  not.  Before  stating  it,  I  must 
observe  that  while  the  relation  between  the  foreign 


474  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

instructor  and  the  Japanese  student  is  artificial,  that 
between  the  Japanese  teacher  and  the  student  is 
traditionally  one  of  sacrifice  and  obligation.  The 
inertia  encountered  by  the  stranger,  the  indifference 
which  chills  him  at  all  times,  are  due  in  great  part 
to  the  misapprehension  arising  from  totally  opposite 
conceptions  of  duty.  Old  sentiment  lingers  long 
after  old  forms  have  passed  away  ;  and  how  much 
of  feudal  Japan  survives  in  modern  Japan,  no 
stranger  can  readily  divine.  Probably  the  bulk  of 
existing  sentiment  is  hereditary  sentiment :  the 
ancient  ideals  have  not  yet  been  replaced  by  fresh 
ones.  ...  In  feudal  times  the  teacher  taught 
without  salary  :  he  was  expected  to  devote  all  his 
time,  thought,  and  strength  to  his  profession. 
High  honour  was  attached  to  that  profession  ;  and 
the  matter  of  remuneration  was  not  discussed,  —  the 
instructor  trusting  wholly  to  the  gratitude  of  parents 
and  pupils.  Public  sentiment  bound  them  to  him 
with  a  bond  that  could,  not  be  broken.  Therefore 
a  general,  upon  the  eve  of  an  assault,  would  take 
care  that  his  former  teacher  should  have  an  oppor 
tunity  to  escape  from  the  place  beleaguered.  The 
tie  between  teacher  and  pupil  was  in  force  second 
only  to  the  tie  between  parent  and  child.  The 
teacher  sacrificed  everything  for  his  pupil :  the 
pupil  was  ready  at  all  times  to  die  for  his  teacher. 
Now,  indeed,  the  hard  and  selfish  aspects  of  Jap 
anese  character  are  coming  to  the  surface.  But  a 


OFFICIAL    EDUCATION  475 

single  fact  will  sufficiently  indicate  how  much  of  the 
old  ethical  sentiment  persists  under  the  new  and 
rougher  surface :  Nearly  all .  the  higher  educational 
work  accomplished  in  Japan  represents^  though  aided 
by  Government^  the  results  of  personal  sacrifice. 

From  the  summit  of  society  to  the  base,  this 
sacrificial  spirit  rules.  That  a  large  part  of  the 
private  income  of  their  Imperial  Majesties  has,  for 
many  years,  been  devoted  to  public  education  is 
well  known ;  but  that  every  person  of  rank  or 
wealth  or  high  position  educates  students  at  his 
private  expense,  is  not  generally  known.  In  the 
majority  of  cases  this  help  is  entirely  gratuitous ; 
in  a  minority  of  cases,  the  expenses  of  the  student 
are  advanced  only,  to  be  repaid  by  instalments  at 
some  future  time.  The  reader  is  doubtless  aware 
that  the  daimyo  in  former  times  used  to  dispose  of 
the  bulk  of  their  incomes  in  supporting  and  helping 
their  retainers ;  supplying  hundreds,  in  some  cases 
thousands,  and  in  some  few  cases,  even  tens  of  thou 
sands,  of  persons  with  the  necessaries  of  life ;  and 
exacting  in  return  military  service,  loyalty,  and 
obedience.  Those  former  daimy5  or  their  suc 
cessors —  particularly  those  who  are  still  large 
landholders  —  now  vie  with  each  other  in  assist 
ing  education.  All  who  can  afford  it  are  educat 
ing  sons  or  grandsons  or  descendants  of  former 
retainers ;  the  subjects  of  this  patronage  being 
annually  selected  from  among  the  students  of 


476  OFFICIAL    EDUCATION 

schools  established  in  the  former  daimiates.  It  is 
only  the  rich  noble  who  can  now  support  a  num 
ber  of  students  gratuitously,  year  after  year ;  the 
poorer  men  of  rank  cannot  care  for  many.  But  all, 
or  very  nearly  all,  maintain  some,  —  and  this  even 
in  cases  where  the  patron's  income  is  so  small  that 
the  expense  could  not  be  borne  unless  the  student 
were  pledged  to  repay  it  after  graduation.  In  some 
instances,  half  of  the  cost  is  borne  by  the  patron  ; 
the  student  being  required  to  repay  the  rest. 

Now  these  aristocratic  examples  are  extensively 
followed  through  other  grades  of  society.  Mer 
chants,  bankers,  and  manufacturers  —  all  rich  men 
of  the  commercial  and  industrial  classes  —  are 
educating  students.  Military  officers,  civil  service 
officials,  physicians,  lawyers,  men  of  every  profes 
sion,  in  short,  are  doing  the  same  thing.  Persons 
whose  incomes  are  too  small  to  permit  of  much 
generosity  are  able  to  help  students  by  employing 
them  as  door-keepers,  messengers,  tutors,  —  giving 
them  board  and  lodging,  and  a  litt'e  pocket-money 
at  times,  in  return  for  light  services.  In  T5kyo, 
and  in  most  of  the  large  cities,  almost  every  large 
house  is  guarded  by  students  who  are  being  thus 
assisted.  As  for  what  the  teachers  do  —  that  re 
quires  special  rrention. 

The  majority  of  teachers  in  the  public  schools  do 
not  receive  salaries  enabling  them  to  help  students 
with  money ;  but  all  teachers  earning  more  than  the 


OFFICIAL    EDUCATION  477 

bare  necessary  give  aid  of  some  sort.  Among  the 
instructors  and  professors  of  the  higher  educational 
establishments,  the  helping  of  students  seems  to  be 
thought  of  as  a  matter  of  course,  —  so  much  a  mat 
ter  of  course  that  we  might  suspect  a  new  "  tyranny 
of  custom/*  especially  in  view  of  the  smallness  of 
official  salaries.  But  no  tyranny  of  custom  would 
explain  the  pleasure  of  sacrifice  and  the  strange  per 
sistence  of  feudal  idealism  which  are  revealed  by 
some  extraordinary  facts.  For  example  :  A  certain 
University  professor  is  known  to  have  supported 
and  educated  a  large  number  of  students  by  divid 
ing  among  them,  during  many  years,  nearly  the 
whole  of  his  salary.  He  lodged,  clothed,  boarded, 
and  educated  them,  bought  their  books,  and  paid 
their  fees,  —  reserving  for  himself  only  the  cost  of 
his  living,  and  reducing  even  that  cost  by  living  upon 
hot  sweet  potatoes.  (Fancy  a  foreign  professor  in 
Japan  putting  himself  upon  a  diet  of  bread  and 
water  for  the  purpose  of  educating  gratuitously  a 
number  of  poor  young  men  ! )  I  know  of  two 
other  cases  nearly  as  remarkable  ;  the  helper,  in 
one  instance,  being  an  old  man  of  more  than  sev 
enty,  who  still  devotes  all  his  means,  time,  and 
knowledge  to  his  ancient  ideal  of  duty.  How  much 
obscure  sacrifice  of  this  kind  has  been  performed  by 
those  least  able  to  afford  it  never  will  be  known : 
indeed,  the  publication  of  the  facts  would  only  give 
pain.  I  am  guilty  of  some  indiscretion  in  mention- 


478  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

ing  even  the  cases  brought  to  my  attention  —  though 
human  nature  is  honoured  by  the  mention.  .  .  .  Now 
it  should  be  evident  that  while  Japanese  students  are 
accustomed  to  witness  self-denial  of  this  sort  on  the 
part  of  native  professors,  they  cannot  be  much  im 
pressed  by  any  manifestation  of  interest  or  sym 
pathy  on  the  part  of  the  foreign  professor,  who, 
though  receiving  a  higher  salary  than  his  Japanese 
colleagues,  has  no  reason  and  small  inclination  to 
imitate  their  example. 

Surely  this  heroic  fact  of  education  sustained  by 
personal  sacrifices,  in  the  face  of  unimaginable  diffi 
culties,  is  enough  to  redeem  much  humbug  and 
wrong.  In  spite  of  the  corruption  which  has  been 
of  late  years  rife  in  educational  circles,  —  in  spite  of 
official  scandals,  intrigues,  and  shams,  —  all  needed 
reforms  can  be  hoped  for  while  the  spirit  of  generous 
self-denial  continues  to  rule  the  world  of  teachers  and 
students.  I  can  venture  also  the  opinion  that  most 
of  the  official  scandals  and  failures  have  resulted 
from  the  interference  of  politics  with  modern  educa 
tion,  or  from  attempting  to  imitate  foreign  conven 
tional  methods  totally  at  variance  with  natiou/  moral 
experience.  Where  Japan  has  remained  true  to  her 
old  moral  ideals  she  has  done  nobly  and  well :  where 
she  has  needlessly  departed  from  them,  sorrow  and 
trouble  have  been  the  natural  consequences. 

There  are  yet  other   facts  in  modern  education 


OFFICIAL   EDUCATION  479 

suggesting  even  more  forcibly  how  much  of  the  old 
life  remains  hidden  under  the  new  conditions,  and 
how  rigidly  race-character  has  become  fixed  in  the 
higher  types  of  mind.  I  refer  chiefly  to  the  results 
of  Japanese  education  abroad,  —  a  higher  special 
training  in  German,  English,  French,  or  American 
Universities.  In  some  directions  these  results,  to 
foreign  observation  at  least,  appear  to  be  almost 
negative.  Considering  the  immense  psychological 
differentiation,  —  the  total  oppositeness  of  mental 
structure  and  habit,  —  it  is  astonishing  that  Japanese 
students  have  been  able  to  do  what  they  actually 
have  done  at  foreign  Universities.  To  graduate  at 
any  European  or  American  University  of  mark, — 
with  a  mind  shaped  by  Japanese  culture,  filled  with 
Chinese  learning,  crammed  with  ideographs,  —  is  a 
prodigious  feat :  scarcely  less  of  a  feat  than  it  would 
be  for  an  American  student  to  graduate  at  a  Chinese 
University.  Certainly  the  men  sent  abroad  to  study 
are  carefully  selected  for  ability ;  and  one  indispen 
sable  requisite  for  the  mission  is  a  power  of  memory 
incomparably  superior  to  the  average  Occidental 
memory,  and  different  altogether  as  to  quality,  — 
a  memory  for  details ;  —  nevertheless,  the  feat  is 
amazing.  But  with  the  return  to  Japan  of  these 
young  scholars,  there  is  commonly  an  end  of  effort 
in  the  direction  of  the  speciality  studied,  — unless  it 
happens  to  have  been  a  purely  practical  subject 
Does  this  signify  incapacity  for  independent  work 


480  OFFICIAL  EDUCATION 

upon  Occidental  lines  ?  incapacity  for  creative 
thought  P  lack  of  constructive  imagination  ?  disin 
clination  or  indifference  ?  The  history  of  that  ter 
rible  mental  and  moral  discipline  to  which  the  race 
was  so  long  subjected  would  certainly  suggest  such 
limitations  in  the  modern  Japanese  mind.  Perhaps 
these  questions  cannot  yet  be  answered,  —  except,  I 
imagine,  as  regards  the  indifference,  which  is  self- 
evident  and  undisguised.  But,  independently  of 
any  question  of  capacity  or  inclination,  there  is  this 
fact  to  be  considered,  —  that  proper  encouragement 
has  not  yet  been  given  to  home-scholarship.  The 
plain  truth  is  that  young  men  are  sent  to  foreign 
seats  of  learning  for  other  ends  than  to  learn  how  to 
devote  the  rest  of  their  lives  to  the  study  of  psy 
chology,  philology,  literature,  or  modern  philosophy. 
They  are  sent  abroad  to  fit  them  for  higher  posts  in 
Government-service ;  and  their  foreign  study  is  but 
one  obligatory  episode  in  their  official  career.  Each 
has  to  qualify  himself  for  special  duty  by  learning 
how  Western  people  study  and  think  and  feel  in 
certain  directions,  and  by  ascertaining  the  range  of 
educational  progress  in  those  directions  ;  but  he  is 
not  ordered  to  think  or  to  feel  like  Western  people 
—  which  would,  in  any  event,  be  impossible  for 
him.  He  has  not,  and  probably  could  not  have, 
any  deep  personal  interest  in  Western  learning  out 
side  of  the  domain  of  applied  science.  His  business 
is  to  learn  how  to  understand  such  matters  from  the 


OFFICIAL   EDUCATION  481 

Japanese,  not  from  the  Occidental,  point  of  view. 
But  he  performs  his  part  well,  does  exactly  what  he 
has  been  told  to  do,  and  rarely  anything  more.  His 
value  to  his  Government  is  doubled  or  quadrupled 
by  his  allotted  experience ;  but  at  home  —  except 
during  a  few  years  of  expected  duty  as  professor  or 
lecturer  —  he  will  probably  use  that  experience  only 
as  a  psychological  costume  of  ceremony,  —  a  mental 
uniform  to  be  donned  when  official  occasion  may 
require. 

It  is  otherwise  in  the  case  of  men  sent  abroad 
for  scientific  studies  requiring,  not  only  intelligence 
and  memory,  but  natural  quickness  of  hand  and 
eye,  —  surgery,  medicine,  military  specialities.  I 
doubt  whether  the  average  efficiency  of  Japanese 
surgeons  can  be  surpassed.  The  study  of  war,  I 
need  hardly  say,  is  one  for  which  the  national  mind 
and  character  have  inherited  aptitude.  But  men 
sent  abroad  merely  to  win  a  foreign  University-de 
gree,  and  destined,  after  a  term  of  educational  duty, 
to  higher  official  life,  appear  to  set  small  value  upon 
their  foreign  acquirements.  However,  even  if  they 
could  win  distinction  in  Europe  by  further  effort  at 
home,  that  effort  would  have  to  be  made  at  a  serious 
pecuniary  sacrifice,  and  its  results  could  not  as  yet 
be  fairly  appreciated  by  their  own  countrymen. 

Some  of  us  have  wondered  at  times  what  the  old 
Egyptians  or  the  old  Greeks  would  have  done  if 

21 


482  OFFICIAL   EDUCATION 

suddenly  brought  into  dangerous  contact  with  a 
civilization  like  our  own,  —  a  civilization  of  applied 
mathematics,  with  sciences  and  branch-sciences  of 
which  the  mere  names  would  fill  a  dictionary.  I 
think  that  the  history  of  modern  Japan  suggests 
very  clearly  what  any  wise  people,  with  a  civiliza 
tion  based  upon  ancestor-worship,  would  have  done. 
They  would  have  speedily  reconstructed  their  patri 
archal  society  to  meet  the  sudden  peril ;  they  would 
have  adopted,  with  astonishing  success,  all  the  scien 
tific  machinery  that  they  could  use ;  they  would  have 
created  a  formidable  army  and  a  highly  efficient  navy ; 
they  would  have  sent  their  young  aristocrats  abroad 
to  study  alien  convention,  and  to  qualify  for  diplo 
matic  duty ;  they  would  have  established  a  new  sys 
tem  of  education,  and  obliged  all  their  children  to 
study  many  new  things  ;  —  but  toward  the  higher 
emotional  and  intellectual  life  of  that  alien  civiliza 
tion,  they  would  naturally  exhibit  indifference :  its 
best  literature,  its  philosophy,  its  broader  forms  of 
tolerant  religion  could  make  no  profound  appeal  to 
their  moral  and  social  experience. 


Industrial   Danger 


Industrial   Danger 

EVERYWHERE  the  course  of  human  civiliza 
tion  has  been  shaped  by  the  same  evolutional 
law ;  and  as  the  earlier  history  of  the  ancient 
European  communities  can  help  us  to  understand 
the  social  conditions  of  Old  Japan,  so  a  later  period 
of  the  same  history  can  help  us  to  divine  something 
of  the  probable  future  of  the  New  Japan.  It  has  been 
shown  by  the  author  of  La  Cite  Antique  that  the 
history  of  all  the  ancient  Greek  and  Latin  commu 
nities  included  four  revolutionary  periods.1  The 
first  revolution  had  everywhere  for  its  issue  the 
withdrawal  of  political  power  from  the  priest-king, 
who  was  nevertheless  allowed  to  retain  the  religious 
authority.  The  second  revolutionary  period  wit 
nessed  the  breaking  up  of  the  gens  or  yeVos,  the 
enfranchisement  of  the  client  from  the  authority 
of  the  patron,  and  several  important  changes  in 

1  Not  excepting  Sparta.  The  Spartan  society  was  evolutionally  much  in  ad 
vance  of  the  Ionian  societies ;  the  Dorian  patriarchal  clan  having  been  dissolved  at 
some  very  early  period.  Sparta  kept  its  Kings ;  but  affairs  of  civil  justice  were 
regulated  by  the  Senate,  and  affairs  of  criminal  justice  by  the  ephors,  who  also  had 
the  power  to  declare  war  and  to  make  treaties  of  peice.  After  the  first  great  revolu 
tion  of  Spartan  history  the  King  was  deprived  of  power  in  civil  matters,  in  criminal 
matters,  and  in  military  matters  :  he  retained  his  sacerdotal  office.  See  for  details, 
La  Cite  Antique ,  pp.  285-287. 

485 


486  INDUSTRIAL    DANGER 

the  legal  constitution  of  the  family.  The  third 
revolutionary  period  saw  the  weakening  of  the 
religious  and  military  aristocracy,  the  entrance  of 
the  common  people  into  the  rights  of  citizenship, 
and  the  rise  of  a  democracy  of  wealth,  —  presently 
to  be  opposed  by  a  democracy  of  poverty.  The 
fourth  revolutionary  period  witnessed  the  first 
bitter  struggles  between  rich  and  poor,  the  final 
triumph  of  anarchy,  and  the  consequent  establish 
ment  of  a  new  and  horrible  form  of  despotism, — 
the  despotism  of  the  popular  Tyrant. 

To  these  four  revolutionary  periods,  the  social 
history  of  Old  Japan  presents  but  two  correspond 
ences.  The  first  Japanese  revolutionary  period 
was  represented  by  the  Fujiwara  usurpation  of  the 
imperial  civil  and  military  authority,  —  after  which 
event  the  aristocracy,  religious  and  military,  really 
governed  Japan  down  to  our  own  time.  All  the 
events  of  the  rise  of  the  military  power  and  the 
concentration  of  authority  under  the  Tokugawa 
Shogunate  properly  belong  to  the  first  revolutionary 
period.  At  the  time  of  the  opening  of  Japan, 
society  had  not  evolutionally  advanced  beyond  a 
stage  corresponding  to  that  of  the  antique  Western 
societies  in  the  seventh  or  eighth  century  before 
Christ.  The  second  revolutionary  period  really 
began  only  with  the  reconstruction  of  society  in 
1871.  But  within  the  space  of  a  single  generation 
thereafter,  Japan  entered  upon  her  third  revolution- 


INDUSTRIAL   DANGER  487 

ary  period.  Already  the  influence  of  the  elder  aris 
tocracy  is  threatened  by  the  sudden  rise  of  a  new 
oligarchy  of  wealth,  —  a  new  industrial  power 
probably  destined  to  become  omnipotent  in  politics. 
The  disintegration  (now  proceeding)  of  the  clan, 
the  changes  in  the  legal  constitution  of  the  family, 
the  entrance  of  the  people  into  the  enjoyment  of 
political  rights,  must  all  tend  to  hasten  the  coming 
transfer  of  power.  There  is  every  indication  that, 
in  the  present  order  of  things,  the  third  revolution 
ary  period  will  run  its  course  rapidly ;  and  then  a 
fourth  revolutionary  period,  fraught  with  serious 
danger,  would  be  in  immediate  prospect. 

Consider  the  bewildering  rapidity  of  recent  changes, 
—  from  the  reconstruction  of  society  in  1871  to  the 
opening  of  the  first  national  parliament  in  1891. 
Down  to  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  the 
nation  had  remained  in  the  condition  common  to 
European  patriarchal  communities  twenty -six  hun 
dred  years  ago :  society  had  indeed  entered  upon  a 
second  period  of  integration,  but  had  traversed  only 
one  great  revolution.  And  then  the  country  was 
suddenly  hurried  through  two  more  social  revolu 
tions  of  the  most  extraordinary  kind,  —  signalized 
by  the  abolition  of  the  daimiates,  the  suppression  of 
the  military  class,  the  substitution  of  a  plebeian  for 
an  aristocratic  army,  popular  enfranchisement,  the 
rapid  formalism  of  a  new  commonalty,  industrial  ex- 


488  INDUSTRIAL    DANGER 

pansion,  the  rise  of  a  new  aristocracy  of  wealth,  and 
popular  representation  in  government !  Old  Japan 
had  never  developed  a  wealthy  and  powerful  middle 
class :  she  had  not  even  approached  that  stage  of 
industrial  development  which,  in  the  ancient  Euro 
pean  societies,  naturally  brought  about  the  first 
political  struggles  between  rich  and  poor.  Her 
social  organization  made  industrial  oppression  im 
possible  :  the  commercial  classes  were  kept  at  the 
bottom  of  society,  —  under  the  feet  even  of  those 
who,  in  more  highly  evolved  communities,  are  most 
at  the  mercy  of  money-power.  But  now  those  com 
mercial  classes,  set  free  and  highly  privileged,  are 
silently  and  swiftly  ousting  the  aristocratic  ruling- 
class  from  power,  —  are  becoming  supremely  im 
portant.  And  under  the  new  order  of  things,  forms 
of  social  misery,  never  before  known  in  the  history 
of  the  race,  are  being  developed.  Some  idea  of  this 
misery  may  be  obtained  from  the  fact  that  the  num 
ber  of  poor  people  in  Tokyo  unable  to  pay  their 
annual  resident-tax  is  upwards  of  50,000 ;  yet  the 
amount  of  the  tax  is  only  about  20  sen,  or  5  pence 
English  money.  Prior  to  the  accumulation  of  wealth 
in  the  hands  of  a  minority  there  was  never  any  such 
want  in  any  part  of  Japan,  —  except,  of  course,  as  a 
temporary  consequence  of  war. 

The  early  history  of  European  civilization  supplies 
analogies.  In  the  Greek  and  Latin  communities, 
up  to  the  time  of  the  dissolution  of  the  gens>  there 


INDUSTRIAL    DANGER  489 

was  no  poverty  in  the  modern  meaning  of  that  word, 
Slavery,  with  some  few  exceptions,  existed  only  in 
the  mild  domestic  form  ;  there  were  yet  no  commer 
cial  oligarchies,  and  no  industrial  oppressions ;  and 
the  various  cities  and  states  were  ruled,  after  political 
power  had  been  taken  from  the  early  kings,  by  mili 
tary  aristocracies  which  also  exercised  religious  func 
tions.  There  was  yet  little  trade  in  the  modern 
signification  of  the  term ;  and  money,  as  current 
coinage,  came  into  circulation  only  in  the  seventh 
century  before  Christ.  Misery  did  not  exist. 
Under  any  patriarchal  system,  based  upon  ancestor- 
worship,  there  is  no  misery,  as  a  consequence 
of  poverty,  except  such  as  may  be  temporarily 
created  by  devastation  or  famine.  If  want  thus 
comes,  it  comes  to  all  alike.  In  such  a  state  of 
society  everybody  is  in  the  service  of  somebody,  and 
receives  in  exchange  for  service  all  the  necessaries  of 
life :  there  is  no  need  for  any  one  to  trouble  himself 
about  the  question  of  living.  Also,  in  such  a  patri 
archal  community,  which  is  self-sufficing,  there  is 
little  need  of  money  :  barter  takes  the  place  of  trade. 
...  In  all  these  respects,  the  condition  of  Old 
Japan  offered  a  close  parallel  to  the  conditions  of 
patriarchal  society  in  ancient  Europe.  While  the 
uji  or  clan  existed,  there  was  no  misery  except  as  a. 
result  of  war,  famine,  or  pestilence.  Throughout 
society  —  excepting  the  small  commercial  class  —  the 
need  of  money  was  rare  ;  and  such  coinage  as  existed 


490  INDUSTRIAL    DANGER 

was  little  suited  to  general  circulation.  Taxes  were 
paid  in  rice  and  other  produce.  As  the  lord  nour 
ished  his  retainers,  so  the  samurai  cared  for  his  de 
pendants,  the  farmer  for  his  labourers,  the  artizan  for 
his  apprentices  and  journeymen,  the  merchant  for 
his  clerks.  Everybody  was  fed ;  and  there  was  no 
need,  in  ordinary  times  at  least,  for  any  one  to  go 
hungry.  It  was  only  with  the  breaking-up  of  the 
clan-system  in  Japan  that  the  possibilities  of  starva 
tion  for  the  worker  first  came  into  existence.  And 
as,  in  antique  Europe,  the  enfranchised  client-class 
and  plebeian-class  developed,  under  like  conditions, 
into  a  democracy  clamouring  for  suffrage  and  all 
political  rights,  so  in  Japan  have  the  common  people 
developed  the  political  instinct,  in  self-protection. 

It  will  be  remembered  how,  in  Greek  and  Roman 
society,  the  aristocracy  founded  upon  religious  tra 
dition  and  military  power  had  to  give  way  to  an 
oligarchy  of  wealth,  and  how  there  subsequently 
came  into  existence  a  democratic  form  of  govern 
ment, —  democratic,  not  in  the  modern,  but  in  the 
old  Greek  meaning.  At  a  yet  later  day  the  results 
of  popular  suffrage  were  the  breaking-up  of  this 
democratic  government,  and  the  initiation  of  an 
atrocious  struggle  between  rich  and  poor.  After 
that  strife  had  begun  there  was  no  more  security 
for  life  or  property  until  the  Roman  conquest  en 
forced  order.  .  .  .  Now  it  seems  not  unlikely 
that  there  will  be  witnessed  in  Japan,  at  no  very 


INDUSTRIAL    DANGER  491 

distant  day,  a  strong  tendency  to  repeat  the  history 
of  the  old  Greek  anarchies.  With  the  constant 
increase  of  poverty  and  pressure  of  population, 
and  the  concomitant  accumulation  of  wealth  in  the 
hands  of  a  new  industrial  class,  the  peril  is  obvious. 
Thus  far  the  nation  has  patiently  borne  all  changes, 
relying  upon  the  experience  of  its  past,  and  trust 
ing  implicitly  to  its  rulers.  But  should  wretch 
edness  be  so  permitted  to  augment  that  the 
question  of  how  to  keep  from  starving  becomes 
imperative  for  the  millions,  the  long  patience  and 
the  long  trust  may  fail.  And  then,  to  repeat  a 
figure  effectively  used  by  Professor  Huxley,  the 
Primitive  Man,  finding  that  the  Moral  Man  has 
landed  him  in  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death, 
may  rise  up  to  take  the  management  of  affairs  into 
his  own  hands,  and  fight  savagely  for  the  right  of 
existence.  As  popular  instinct  is  not  too  dull  to 
divine  the  first  cause  of  this  misery  in  the  introduc 
tion  of  Western  industrial  methods,  it  is  unpleasant 
to  reflect  what  such  an  upheaval  might  signify.  But 
nothing  of  moment  has  yet  been  done  to  ameliorate 
the  condition  of  the  wretched  class  of  operatives, 
now  estimated  to  exceed  half  a  million. 

M.  de  Coulanges  has  pointed  out1  that  the 'ab 
sence  of  individual  liberty  was  the  real  cause  of  the 
disorders  and  the  final  ruin  of  the  Greek  societies, 

1  La  Cite  Antique,  pp.  400-401. 


492  INDUSTRIAL   DANGER 

Rome  suffered  less,  and  survived,  and  dominated, — 
because  within  her  boundaries  the  rights  of  the  indi 
vidual  had  been  more  respected.  .  .  .  Now  the 
absence  of  individual  freedom  in  modern  Japan 
would  certainly  appear  to  be  nothing  less  than  a 
national  danger.  For  those  very  habits  of  unques 
tioning  obedience,  and  loyalty,  and  respect  for 
authority,  which  made  feudal  society  possible,  are 
likely  to  render  a  true  democratic  regime  impossible, 
and  would  tend  to  bring  about  a  state  of  anarchy. 
Only  races  long  accustomed  to  personal  liberty, — 
liberty  to  think  about  matters  of  ethics  apart  from 
matters  of  government,  —  liberty  to  consider  ques 
tions  of  right  and  wrong,  justice  and  injustice,  inde 
pendently  of  political  authority,  —  are  able  to  face 
without  risk  the  peril  now  menacing  Japan.  For 
should  social  disintegration  take  in  Japan  the  same 
course  which  it  followed  in  the  old  European  socie 
ties, —  unchecked  by  any  precautionary  legislation, 
—  and  so  bring  about  another  social  revolution,  the 
consequence  could  scarcely  be  less  than  utter  ruin. 
In  the  antique  world  of  Europe,  the  total  disintegra 
tion  of  the  patriarchal  system  occupied  centuries : 
it  was  slow,  and  it  was  normal  —  not  having  been 
brought  about  by  external  forces.  In  Japan,  on 
the  contrary,  this  disintegration  is  taking  place 
under  enormous  outside  pressure,  operating  with 
the  rapidity  of  electricity  and  steam.  In  Greek 
societies  the  changes  were  effected  in  about  three 


INDUSTRIAL   DANGER  493 

hundred  years ;  in  Japan  it  is  hardly  more  than 
thirty  years  since  the  patriarchal  system  was  legally 
dissolved  and  the  industrial  system  reshaped ;  yet 
already  the  danger  of  anarchy  is  in  sight,  and  the 
population  —  astonishingly  augmented  by  more  than 
ten  millions — already  begins  to  experience  all  the 
forms  of  misery  developed  by  want  under  industrial 
conditions. 

It  was  perhaps  inevitable  that  the  greatest  free- 
H->m  accorded  under  the  new  order  of  things  should 
have  been  given  in  the  direction  of  greatest  danger. 
Though  the  Government  cannot  be  said  to  have 
done  much  for  any  form  of  competition  within  the 
sphere  of  its  own  direct  control,  it  has  done  even  more 
than  could  have  been  reasonably  expected  on  behalf 
of  national  industrial  competition.  Loans  have  been 
lavishly  advanced,  subsidies  generously  allowed ;  and, 
in  spite  of  various  panics  and  failures,  the  results  have 
been  prodigious.  Within  thirty  years  the  value  of 
articles  manufactured  for  export  has  risen  from  half 
a  million  to  five  hundred  million  yen.  But  this 
immense  development  has  been  effected  at  serious 
cost  in  other  directions.  The  old  methods  of  family 
production  —  and  therefore  most  of  the  beautiful 
industries  and  arts,  for  which  Japan  has  been  so 
long  famed  —  now  seem  doomed  beyond  hope ; 
and  instead  of  the  ancient  kindly  relations  between 
master  and  workers,  there  have  been  brought  into 
existence  —  with  no  legislation  to  restrain  inhuman- 


494  INDUSTRIAL    DANGER 

ity  —  all  the  horrors  of  factory-life  at  its  worst.  The 
new  combinations  of  capital  have  actually  reestab 
lished  servitude,  under  harsher  forms  than  ever 
were  imagined  under  the  feudal  era ;  the  misery  of 
the  women  and  children  subjected  to  that  servitude 
is  a  public  scandal,  and  proves  strange  possibilities 
of  cruelty  on  the  part  of  a  people  once  renowned  for 
kindness,  —  kindness  even  to  animals. 

There  is  now  a  humane  outcry  for  reform  ;  and 
earnest  efforts  have  been  made,  and  will  be  mad^ 
to  secure  legislation  for  the  protection  of  operatives. 
But,  as  might  be  expected,  these  efforts  have  been 
hitherto  strongly  opposed  by  manufacturing  com 
panies  and  syndicates  with  the  declaration  that  any 
Government  interference  with  factory  management 
will  greatly  hamper,  if  not  cripple,  enterprise,  and 
hinder  competition  with  foreign  industry.  Less 
than  twenty  years  ago  the  very  same  arguments  were 
used  in  England  to  oppose  the  efforts  then  being 
made  to  improve  the  condition  of  the  industrial 
classes ;  and  that  opposition  was  challenged  by  Pro 
fessor  Huxley  in  a  noble  address,  which  every 
Japanese  legislator  would  do  well  to  read  to-day. 
Speaking  of  the  reforms  in  progress  during  1888, 
the  professor  said :  — 

"  If  it  is  said  that  the  carrying  out  of  such  arrangements 
as  those  indicated  must  enhance  the  cost  of  production, 
and  thus  handicap  the  producer  in  the  race  of  competition, 
I  venture,  in  the  first  place,  to  doubt  the  fact ;  but,  if  it  be 


INDUSTRIAL   DANGER  495 

so,  it  results  that  industrial  society  has  to  face  a  dilemma, 
either  alternative  of  which  threatens  destruction. 

"  On  the  one  hand,  a  population,  the  labour  of  which 
is  sufficiently  remunerated,  may  be  physically  and  morally 
healthy,  and  socially  stable,  but  may  fail  in  industrial  com 
petition  by  reason  of  the  dearness  of  its  produce.  On  the 
other  hand,  a  population,  the  labour  of  which  is  insufficiently 
remunerated,  must  become  physically  and  morally  un 
healthy,  and  socially  unstable;  and  though  it  may  succeed 
for  a  while  in  competition,  by  reason  of  the  cheapness  of 
its  produce,  it  must  in  the  end  fall,  through  hideous  misery 
and  degradation,  to  utter  ruin. 

"  Well,  if  these  be  the  only  alternatives,  let  us  for  our 
selves  and  our  children  choose  the  former,  and,  if  need  be, 
starve  like  men.  But  I  do  not  believe  that  a  stable  society, 
made  up  of  healthy,  vigorous,  instructed,  and  self-ruling 
people  would  ever  incur  serious  risk  of  that  fate.  They 
are  not  likely  to  be  troubled  with  many  competitors  of  the 
same  character  just  yet ;  and  they  may  be  safely  trusted  to 
find  ways  of  holding  their  own."  l 

If  the  future  of  Japan  could  depend  upon  her  army 
and  her  navy,  upon  the  high  courage  of  her  peo 
ple  and  their  readiness  to  die  by  the  hundred  thou 
sand  for  ideals  of  honour  and  of  duty,  there  would  be 
small  cause  for  alarm  in  the  present  state  of  affairs. 
Unfortunately  her  future  must  depend  upon  other 
qualities  than  courage,  other  abilities  than  those  of 

1  The  Struggle  for  Existence  in  Human  Society,  "  Collected  Essays,"  Vol.  IX, 
pp.  218-219. 


496  INDUSTRIAL    DANGER 

sacrifice ;  and  her  struggle  hereafter  must  be  one  in 
which  her  social  traditions  will  place  her  at  an 
immense  disadvantage.  The  capacity  for  industrial 
competition  cannot  be  made  to  depend  upon  the 
misery  of  women  and  children ;  it  must  depend 
upon  the  intelligent  freedom  of  the  individual ;  and 
the  society  which  suppresses  this  freedom,  or  suffers 
it  to  be  suppressed,  must  remain  too  rigid  for  com 
petition  with  societies  in  which  the  liberties  of  the 
individual  are  strictly  maintained.  While  Japan  con 
tinues  to  think  and  to  act  by  groups,  even  by  groups 
of  industrial  companies,  so  long  she  must  always 
continue  incapable  of  her  best.  Her  ancient  social 
experience  is  not  sufficient  to  avail  her  for  the  future 
international  struggle,  —  rather  it  must  sometimes 
impede  her  as  so  much  dead  weight.  Dead,  Li  the 
ghostliest  sense  of  the  word,  —  the  viewless  pressure 
upon  her  life  of  numberless  vanished  generations. 
She  will  have  not  only  to  strive  against  colossal  odds 
in  her  rivalry  with  more  plastic  and  more  forceful 
societies ;  she  will  have  to  strive  much  more  against 
the  power  of  her  phantom  past. 

Yet  it  were  a  grievous  error  to  imagine  that  she 
has  nothing  further  to  gain  from  her  ancestral  faith. 
All  her  modern  successes  have  been  aided  by  it , 
and  all  her  modern  failures  have  been  marked  by 
needless  breaking  with  its  ethical  custom.  She  could 
compel  her  people,  by  a  simple  fiat,  to  adopt  the 


INDUSTRIAL    DANGER  497 

civilization  of  the  West,  with  all  its  pain  and  struggle, 
only  because  that  people  had  been  trained  for  ages 
in  submission  and  loyalty  and  sacrifice  ;  and  the  time 
has  not  yet  come  in  which  she  can  afford  to  cast 
away  the  whole  of  her  moral  past.  More  freedom 
indeed  she  requires,  —  but  freedom  restrained  by 
wisdom ;  freedom  to  think  and  act  and  strive  for 
self  as  well  as  for  others,  —  not  freedom  to  oppress 
the  weak,  or  to  exploit  the  simple.  And  the  new 
cruelties  of  her  industrial  life  can  find  no  justification 
in  the  traditions  of  her  ancient  faith,  which  exacted 
absolute  obedience  from  the  dependant,  but  equally 
required  the  duty  of  kindness  from  the  master.  In 
so  far  as  she  has  permitted  her  people  to  depart  from 
the  way  of  kindness,  she  herself  has  surely  departed 
from  the  Way  of  the  Gods.  .  .  . 

And  the  domestic  future  appears  dark.  Born  of 
that  darkness,  an  evil  dream  comes  oftentimes  to 
those  who  love  Japan :  the  fear  that  all  her  efforts 
are  being  directed,  with  desperate  heroism,  only  to 
prepare  the  land  for  the  sojourn  of  peoples  older 
by  centuries  in  commercial  experience ;  that  her 
thousands  of  miles  of  railroads  and  telegraphs,  her 
mines  and  forges,  her  arsenals  and  factories,  her  docks 
and  fleets,  are  being  put  in  order  for  the  use  of 
foreign  capital ;  that  her  admirable  army  and  her 
heroic  navy  may  be  doomed  to  make  their  last  sacri 
fices  in  hopeless  contest  against  some  combination 
of  greedy  states,  provoked  or  encouraged  to  aggres- 

2K 


498  INDUSTRIAL   DANGER 

sion  by  circumstances  beyond  the  power  of  Govern 
ment  to  control.  ...  But  the  statesmanship  that 
has  already  guided  Japan  through  so  many  storms 
should  prove  able  to  cope  with  this  gathering  peril. 


Reflections 


—  "  Institutions  are  dependent  on  char 
acter  ,•  and,  however  changed  in  their 
superficial  aspects,  cannot  be  changed  in 
their  essential  natures  faster  than  character 
changes.  .  .  ."  "Sudden  changes  of 
religious  institutions,  as  of  political  insti 
tutions,  are  certain  to  be  followed  by 
reactions. ' '  —  HERBERT  SPENCER,  Auto- 
tiograpby. 


Reflections 

IN  the  preceding  pages  I  have  endeavoured  to 
suggest  a  general  idea  of  the  social  history  of 
Japan,  and  a  general  idea  of  the  nature  of 
those  forces  which  shaped  and  tempered  the  char 
acter  of  her  people.  Certainly  this  attempt  leaves 
much  to  be  desired :  the  time  is  yet  far  away  at 
which  a  satisfactory  work  upon  the  subject  can  be 
prepared.  But  the  fact  that  Japan  can  be  under 
stood  only  through  the  study  of  her  religious  and 
social  evolution,  has  been,  I  trust,  sufficiently  indi 
cated.  She  affords  us  the  amazing  spectacle  of  an 
Eastern  society  maintaining  all  the  outward  forms 
of  Western  civilization;  using,  with  unquestionable 
efficiency,  the  applied  science  of  the  Occident ; 
accomplishing,  by  prodigious  effort,  the  work  of 
centuries  within  the  time  of  three  decades,  —  yet 
sociologically  remaining  at  a  stage  corresponding  to 
that  which,  in  ancient  Europe,  preceded  the  Chris 
tian  era  by  hundreds  of  years. 

But  no  suggestion  of  origins  and  causes  should 
diminish  the  pleasure  of  contemplating  this  curious 
world,  psychologically  still  so  far  away  from  us  in 
the  course  of  human  evolution.  The  wonder  and 

501 


502  REFLECTIONS 

the  beauty  of  what  remains  of  the  Old  Japan  cannot 
be  lessened  by  any  knowledge  of  the  conditions  that 
produced  them.  The  old  kindliness  and  grace  of 
manners  need  not  cease  to  charm  us  because  we 
know  that  such  manners  were  cultivrted,  for  a 
thousand  years,  under  the  edge  of  the  ?  .vord.  The 
common  politeness  which  appeared,  but  a  few  years 
ago,  to  be  almost  universal,  and  the  rarity  of  quar 
rels,  should  not  prove  less  agreeable  because  we  h" /e 
learned  that,  for  generations  and  generations,  all 
quarrels  among  the  people  were  punished  with  ex 
traordinary  rigour ;  and  that  the  custom  of  the 
vendetta,  which  rendered  necessary  such  repression, 
also  made  everybody  cautious  of  word  and  deed. 
The  popular  smile  should  not  seem  less  winning 
because  we  have  been  told  of  a  period,  in  the  past 
of  the  subject-classes,  when  not  to  smile  in  the 
teeth  of  pain  might  cost  life  itself.  And  the  Jap 
anese  woman,  as  cultivated  by  the  old  home-training, 
is  not  less  sweet  a  being  because  she  represents  the 
moral  ideal  of  a  vanishing  world,  and  because  we 
can  faintly  surmise  the  cost,  —  the  incalculable  cost 
in  pain,  —  of  producing  her. 

No :  what  remains  of  this  elder  civilization  is  full 
of  charm,  —  charm  unspeakable,  —  and  to  witness 
its  gradual  destruction  must  be  a  grief  for  whomso 
ever  has  felt  that  charm.  However  intolerable  may 
seem,  to  the  mind  of  the  artist  or  poet,  those  count 
less  restrictions  which  once  ruled  all  this  fairy-world, 


REFLECTIONS  503 

and  shaped  the  soul  of  it,  he  cannot  but  admire  and 
love  their  best  results  :  the  simplicity  of  old  custom, 

—  the    amiability  of  manners, —  the  daintiness    of 
habits,  —  the  delicate  tact  displayed  in  pleasure-giv 
ing,  —  the   strange  power  of  presenting  outwardly, 
under  any  circumstances,  only  the  best  and  brightest 
aspects  of  character.     What    emotional  poetry,  for 
even  the  least  believing,  in   the  ancient  home-reli 
gion,  —  in  the  lamplet  nightly  kindled    before  the 
manes   of  the  dead,  the  tiny  offerings  of  food  and 
drink,  the  welcome-fires  lighted  to  guide  the  visiting 
ghosts,  the  little  ships  prepared  to  bear  them  back 
to   their   rest !     And   this   immemorial   doctrine   of 
filial  piety,  —  exacting  all  that  is  noble,  not  less  than 
all  that  is  terrible,  in    duty,  in    gratitude,   in    self- 
denial, —  what  strange  appeal  does  it  make  to  our 
lingering  religious  instincts  ;    and  how  close  to  the 
divine  appear  to  us  the  finer  natures  forged  by  it ! 
What  queer  weird  attraction  in  those  parish-temple 
festivals,   with  their   happy  mingling   of  merriment 
and  devotion  in  the  presence  of  the  gods  !     What 
a  universe  of  romance  in  that  Buddhist  art  which 
has    left    its    impress    upon    almost   every    product 
of  industry,  from    the  toy   of  a  child   to  the   heir 
loom  of  a    prince ;  — which    has  peopled  the    soli 
tudes    with    statues,    and    chiselled     the     wayside 
rocks    with  texts    of  sutras  !     Who  can  forget  the 
soft    enchantment    of   this    Buddhist    atmosphere  ? 

—  the     deep    music    of    the    great    bells  ?  —  the 


504  REFLECTIONS 

green  peace  of  gardens  haunted  by  fearless  things : 
doves  that  flutter  down  at  call,  fishes  rising 
to  be  fed  ?  .  .  .  Despite  our  incapacity  to  enter 
into  the  soul-life  of  this  ancient  East,  —  despite 
the  certainty  that  one  might  as  well  hope  to  re 
mount  the  River  of  Time  and  share  the  van 
ished  existence  of  some  old  Greek  city,  as  to 
share  the  thoughts  and  the  emotions  of  Old 
Japan,  —  we  find  ourselves  bewitched  forever  by 
the  vision,  like  those  wanderers  of  folk-tale  who 
rashly  visited  Elf-land. 

We  know  that  there  is  illusion,  —  not  as  to  the 
reality  of  the  visible,  but  as  to  its  meanings,  —  very 
much  illusion.  Yet  why  should  this  illusion  attract 
us,  like  some  glimpse  of  Paradise?  —  why  should 
we  feel  obliged  to  confess  the  ethical  glamour  of  a 
civilization  as  far  away  from  us  in  thought  as  the 
Egypt  of  Ramses  ?  Are  we  really  charmed  by  the 
results  of  a  social  discipline  that  refused  to  recognize 
the  individual  ?  —  enamoured  of  a  cult  that  exacted 
the  suppression  of  personality  ? 

No :  the  charm  is  made  by  the  fact  that  this 
vision  of  the  past  represents  to  us  much  more  than 
past  or  present,  —  that  it  foreshadows  the  possibili 
ties  of  some  higher  future,  in  a  world  of  perfect 
sympathy.  After  many  a  thousand  years  there  may 
be  developed  a  humanity  able  to  achieve,  with  never 
a  shadow  of  illusion,  those  ethical  conditions  prefig 
ured  by  the  ideals  of  Old  Japan  :  instinctive  unself- 


REFLECTIONS  505 

ishness,  a  common  desire  to  find  the  joy  of  life  in 
making  happiness  for  others,  a  universal  sense  of 
moral  beauty.  And  whenever  men  shall  have  so 
far  gained  upon  the  present  as  to  need  no  other  code 
than  the  teaching  of  their  own  hearts,  then  indeed 
the  ancient  ideal  of  Shinto  will  find  its  supreme 
realization. 

Moreover,  it  should  be  remembered  that  the 
social  state,  whose  results  thus  attract  us,  really 
produced  much  more  than  a  beautiful  mirage.  Sim 
ple  characters  of  great  charm,  though  necessarily  of 
great  fixity,  were  developed  by  it  in  multitude.  Old 
Japan  came  nearer  to  the  achievement  of  the  high 
est  moral  ideal  than  our  far  more  evolved  soci 
eties  can  hope  to  do  for  many  a  hundred  years. 
And  but  for  those  ten  centuries  of  war  which  fol 
lowed  upon  the  rise  of  the  military  power,  the  ethi 
cal  end  to  which  all  social  discipline  tended  might 
have  been  much  more  closely  approached.  Yet  if 
the  better  side  of  this  human  nature  had  been 
further  developed  at  the  cost  of  darker  and  sterner 
qualities,  the  consequence  might  have  proved  un 
fortunate  for  the  nation.  No  people  so  ruled  by 
altruism  as  to  lose  its  capacities  for  aggression  and 
cunning,  could  hold  their  own,  in  the  present  state 
of  the  world,  against  races  hardened  by  the  disci 
pline  of  competition  as  well  as  by  the  discipline  of 
war.  The  future  Japan  must  rely  upon  the  least 


506  REFLECTIONS 

amiable  qualities  of  her  character  for  success  in  the 
universal  struggle ;  and  she  will  need  to  develop 
them  strongly. 

#   * 

How  strongly  she  has  been  able  to  develop 
them  in  one  direction,  the  present  war  with 
Russia  bears  startling  witness.  But  it  is  certainly 
to  the  long  discipline  of  the  past  that  she  owes  the 
moral  strength  behind  this  unexpected  display  of 
aggressive  power.  No  superficial  observation  could 
discern  the  silent  energies  masked  by  the  resigna 
tion  of  the  people  to  change,  —  the  unconscious 
heroism  informing  this  mass  of  forty  million  souls, 
—  the  compressed  force  ready  to  expand  at  Impe 
rial  bidding  either  for  construction  or  destruction. 
From  the  leaders  of  a  nation  with  such  a  military 
and  political  history,  one  might  expect  the  manifes 
tation  of  all  those  abilities  of  supreme  importance 
in  diplomacy  and  war.  But  such  capacities  could 
prove  of  little  worth  were  it  not  for  the  character  of 
the  masses,  —  the  quality  of  the  material  that  moves 
to  command  with  the  power  of  winds  and  tides. 
The  veritable  strength  of  Japan  still  lies  in  the 
moral  nature  of  her  common  people,  —  her  farmers 
and  fishers,  artizans  and  labourers,  —  the  patient 
quiet  folk  one  sees  toiling  in  the  rice-fields,  or 
occupied  with  the  humblest  of  crafts  and  callings  in 
city  by-ways.  All  the  unconscious  heroism  of  the 
race  is  in  these,  and  all  its  splendid  courage,  —  a 


REFLECTIONS  507 

courage  that  does  not  mean  indifference  to  life,  but 
the  desire  to  sacrifice  life  at  the  bidding  of  the 
Imperial  Master  who  raises  the  ranks  of  the  dead. 
From  the  thousands  of  young  men  now  being  sum 
moned  to  the  war,  one  hears  no  expression  of  hope 
to  return  to  their  homes  with  glory; — the  com 
mon  wish  uttered  is  only  to  win  remembrance  at 
the  Shokonsha —  that  "Spirit-Invoking  Temple," 
where  the  souls  of  all  who  die  for  Emperor  and 
fatherland  are  believed  to  gather.  At  no  time  was 
the  ancient  faith  stronger  than  in  this  hour  of 
struggle  ;  and  Russian  power  will  have  very  much 
more  to  fear  from  that  faith  than  from  repeating 
rifles  or  Whitehead  torpedoes.1  Shint5,  as  a  reli 
gion  of  patriotism,  is  a  force  that  should  suffice,  if 
permitted  fair-play,  to  affect  not  only  the  destinies 
of  the  whole  Far  East,  but  the  future  of  civiliza 
tion.  No  more  irrational  assertion  was  ever  made 
about  the  Japanese  than  the  statement  of  their 
indifference  to  religion.  Religion  is  still,  as  it  has 

1  The  following  reply,  made  by  Vice-Admiral  Togo,  Commander-in-Chief  of 
the  Japanese  fleet,  to  an  Imperial  message  of  commendation  received  after  the 
second  attempt  to  block  the  entrance  to  Port  Arthur,  is  characteristically  Shinto  :  — 

"  The  warm  message  which  Your  Imperial  Majesty  condescended  to  grant  us  with 
regard  to  the  second  attempt  to  seal  Port  Arthur,  has  not  only  overwhelmed  us  with 
gratitude,  but  may  also  influence  the  patriotic  manes  of  the  departed  heroes  to  hover 
long  over  the  battle-field  and  give  unseen  protection  to  the  Imperial  forces,"  .  .  . 
[Translated  in  the  JAPAN  TIMES  of  March  3/st,  IQOJ. 

—  Such  thoughts  and  hopes  about  the  brave  dead  might  have  been  uttered  by  a 
Greek  admiral  after  the  battle  of  Salamis.  The  faith  and  courage  which  helped  the 
Greeks  to  repel  the  Persian  invasion  were  of  precisely  the  same  quality  as  that  reli 
gious  heroism  which  now  helps  the  Japanese  to  challenge  the  power  of  Russia. 


508  REFLECTIONS 

ever  been,  the  very  life  of  the  people,  —  the  motive 
and  the  directing  power  of  their  every  action  :  a  reli 
gion  of  doing  and  suffering,  a  religion  without  cant 
and  hypocrisy.  And  the  qualities  especially  devel 
oped  by  it  are  just  those  qualities  which  have  startled 
Russia,  and  may  yet  cause  her  many  a  painful  sur 
prise.  She  has  discovered  alarming  force  where  she 
imagined  childish  weakness  ;  she  has  encountered 
heroism  where  she  expected  to  find  timidity  and 

helplessness.1 

* 
*  * 

For  countless  reasons  this  terrible  war  (of  which 
no  man  can  yet  see  the  end)  is  unspeakably  to  be 
regretted ;  and  of  these  reasons  not  the  least  are 
industrial.  War  must  temporarily  check  all  ten 
dencies  towards  the  development  of  that  healthy 
individualism  without  which  no  modern  nation  can 
become  prosperous  and  wealthy.  Enterprise  is 
numbed,  markets  paralyzed,  manufactures  stopped. 
Yet,  in  the  extraordinary  case  of  this  extraordinary 
people,  it  is  possible  that  the  social  effects  of  the 
contest  will  prove  to  some  degree  beneficial.  Prior 
to  hostilities,  there  had  been  a  visible  tendency  to 

1  The  case  of  the  Japanese  officers  and  men  on  the  transport  Kinsbu  Maru, 
sunk  by  the  Russian  warships  on  the  26th  of  last  April,  should  have  given  the 
enemy  matter  for  reflection.  Although  allowed  an  hour's  time  for  consideration, 
the  soldiers  refused  to  surrender,  and  opened  fire  with  their  rifles  on  the  battleships. 
Then,  before  the  Kinsbu  Maru  was  blown  in  two  by  a  torpedo,  a  number  of  the 
Japanese  officers  and  men  performed  barakiri.  .  .  .  This  striking  display  of  the 
fierce  old  feudal  spirit  suggests  how  dearly  a  Russian  success  would  be  bought. 


REFLECTIONS  509 

the  premature  dissolution  of  institutions  founded 
upon  centuries  of  experience,  —  a  serious  likelihood 
of  moral  disintegration.  That  great  changes  must 
hereafter  be  made,  —  that  the  future  well-being  of 
the  country  requires  them,  —  would  seem  to  admit 
of  no  argument.  But  it  is  necessary  that  such 
changes  be  effected  by  degrees,  —  not  with  such 
inopportune  haste  as  to  imperil  the  moral  constitu 
tion  of  the  nation.  A  war  for  independence,  —  a 
war  that  obliges  the  race  to  stake  its  all  upon  the 
issue,  —  must  bring  about  a  tightening  of  the  old 
social  bonds,  a  strong  quickening  of  the  ancient 
sentiments  of  loyalty  and  duty,  a  reinforcement  of 
conservatism.  This  will  signify  retrogression  in 
some  directions ;  but  it  will  also  mean  invigoration 
in  others.  Before  the  Russian  menace,  the  Soul  of 
Yamato  revives  again.  Out  of  the  contest  Japan 
will  come,  if  successful,  morally  stronger  than  be 
fore  ;  and  a  new  sense  of  self-confidence,  a  new  spirit 
of  independence,  might  then  reveal  itself  in  the 
national  attitude  toward  foreign  policy  and  foreign 
pressure. 

—  There  would  be,  of  course,  the  danger  of  over- 
confidence.  A  people  able  to  defeat  Russian  power 
on  land  and  sea  might  be  tempted  to  believe  them 
selves  equally  able  to  cope  with  foreign  capital  upon 
their  own  territory ;  and  every  means  would  cer 
tainly  be  tried  of  persuading  or  bullying  the  govern- 


5io  REFLECTIONS 

ment  into  some  fatal  compromise  on  the  question  of 
the  right  of  foreigners  to  hold  land.  Efforts  in  this 
direction  have  been  carried  on  persistently  and  sys 
tematically  for  years ;  and  these  efforts  seem  to 
have  received  some  support  from  a  class  of  Japan 
ese  politicians,  apparently  incapable  of  understand 
ing  what  enormous  tyranny  a  single  privileged 
syndicate  of  foreign  capital  would  be  capable  of 
exercising  in  such  a  country.  It  appears  to  me 
that  any  person  comprehending,  even  in  the  vaguest 
way,  the  nature  of  money-power  and  the  average 
conditions  of  life  throughout  Japan,  must  recognize 
the  certainty  that  foreign  capital,  with  right  of  land- 
tenure,  would  find  means  to  control  legislation,  to 
control  government,  and  to  bring  about  a  state  of 
affairs  that  would  result  in  the  practical  domination 
of  the  empire  by  alien  interests.  I  cannot  resist 
the  conviction  that  when  Japan  yields  to  foreign 
industry  the  right  to  purchase  land,  she  is  lost 
beyond  hope.  The  self-confidence  that  might 
tempt  to  such  yielding,  in  view  of  immediate  ad 
vantages,  would  be  fatal.  Japan  has  incomparably 
more  to  fear  from  English  or  American  capital  than 
from  Russian  battleships  and  bayonets.  Behind 
her  military  capacity  is  the  disciplined  experience  of 
a  thousand  years  ;  behind  her  industrial  and  com 
mercial  power,  the  experience  of  half-a-century. 
But  she  has  been  fully  warned ;  and  if  she  chooses 
hereafter  to  invite  her  own  ruin,  it  will  not  have 


REFLECTIONS  511 

been  for  lack  of  counsel,  —  since  she  had  the  wisest 
man  in  the  world  to  advise  her.1 

To  the  reader  of  these  pages,  at  least,  the  strength 
and  the  weakness  of  the  new  social  organization  — 
its  great  capacities  for  offensive  or  defensive  action 
in  military  directions,  and  its  comparative  feebleness 
in  other  directions  —  should  now  be  evident.  All 
things  considered,  the  marvel  is  that  Japan  should 
have  been  so  well  able  to  hold  her  own ;  and  it  was 
assuredly  no  common  wisdom  that  guided  her  first 
unsteady  efforts  in  new  and  perilous  ways.  Cer-v 
tainly  her  power  to  accomplish  what  she  has  accom 
plished  was  derived  from  her  old  religious  and  social 
training :  she  was  able  to  keep  strong  because,  under 
the  new  forms  of  rule  and  the  new  conditions  of  so 
cial  activity,  she  could  still  maintain  a  great  deal  of 
the  ancient  discipline.  But  even  thus  it  was  only 
by  the  firmest  and  shrewdest  policy  that  she  could 
avert  disaster,  —  could  prevent  the  disruption  of  her 
whole  social  structure  under  the  weight  of  alien  press 
ure.  It  was  imperative  that  vast  changes  should  be 
made,  but  equally  imperative  that  they  should  not 
be  of  a  character  to  endanger  the  foundations ;  and 
it  was  above  all  things  necessary,  while  preparing 
for  immediate  necessities,  to  provide  against  future 
perils.  Never  before,  perhaps,  in  the  history  of 
human  civilization,  did  any  rulers  find  themselves 

1  Herbert  Spencer. 


512  REFLECTIONS 

obliged  to  cope  with  problems  so  tremendous,  so 
complicated,  and  so  inexorable.  And  of  these  prob 
lems  the  most  inexorable  remains  to  be  solved.  It 
is  furnished  by  the  fact  that  although  all  the  suc 
cesses  of  Japan  have  been  so  far  due  to  unselfish 
collective  action,  sustained  by  the  old  Shinto  ideals 
of  duty  and  obedience,  her  industrial  future  must 
depend  upon  egoistic  individual  action  of  a  totally 

opposite  kind ! 

* 
*   * 

What  then  will  become  of  the  ancient  morality  ? 
—  the  ancient  cult  ? 

—  In  this  moment  the  conditions  are  abnormal. 
But  it  seems  certain  that  there  will  be,  under  normal 
conditions,  a  further  gradual  loosening  of  the  old 
family-bonds  ;  and  this  would  bring  about  a  further 
disintegration.  By  the  testimony  of  the  Japanese 
themselves,  such  disintegration  was  spreading  rapidly 
among  the  upper  and  middle  classes  of  the  great 
cities,  prior  to  the  present  war.  Among  the  people 
of  the  agricultural  districts,  and  even  in  the  country 
towns,  the  old  ethical  order  of  things  has  yet  been 
little  affected.  And  there  are  other  influences  than 
legislative  change  or  social  necessity  which  are  work 
ing  for  disintegration.  Old  beliefs  have  been  rudely 
shaken  by  the  introduction  of  larger  knowledge :  a 
new  generation  is  being  taught,  in  twenty-seven 
thousand  primary  schools,  the  rudiments  of  science 
and  the  modern  conception  of  the  universe.  The 


REFLECTIONS  513 

Buddhist  cosmology,  with  its  fantastic  pictures  of 
Mount  Meru,  has  become  a  nursery-tale ;  the  old 
Chinese  nature-philosophy  finds  believers  only 
among  the  little  educated,  or  the  survivors  of 
the  feudal  era ;  and  the  youngest  schoolboy  has 
learned  that  the  constellations  are  neither  gods  nor 
Buddhas,  but  far-off  groups  of  suns.  No  longer 
can  popular  fancy  picture  the  Milky  Way  as  the 
River  of  Heaven ;  the  legend  of  the  Weaving- 
Maiden,  and  her  waiting  lover,  and  the  Bridge  of 
Birds,  is  now  told  only  to  children ;  and  the  young 
fisherman,  though  steering,  like  his  fathers,  by  the 
light  of  stars,  no  longer  discerns  in  the  northern  sky 
the  form  of  Mioken  Bosatsu. 

Yet  it  were  easy  to  misinterpret  the  weakening  of 
a  certain  class  of  old  beliefs,  or  the  visible  tendency 
to  social  change.  Under  any  circumstances  a  reli 
gion  decays  slowly  ;  and  the  most  conservative  forms 
of  religion  are  the  last  to  yield  to  disintegration.  It 
were  a  grave  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  ancestor- 
cult  has  yet  been  appreciably  affected  by  exterior 
influences  of  any  kind,  or  to  imagine  that  it  con 
tinues  to  exist  merely  by  force  of  hallowed  custom, 
and  not  because  the  majority  still  believe.  No  reli 
gion  —  and  least  of  all  the  religion  of  the  dead  — 
could  thus  suddenly  lose  its  hold  upon  the  affections 
of  the  race  that  evolved  it.  Even  in  other  directions 
the  new  scepticism  is  superficial :  it  has  not  spread 
downwards  into  the  core  of  things.  There  is  indeed 


2L 


5i4  REFLECTIONS 

a  growing  class  of  young  men  with  whom  scepti 
cism  of  a  certain  sort  is  the  fashion,  and  scorn  of  the 
past  an  affectation ;  but  even  among  these  no  word 
of  disrespect  concerning  the  religion  of  the  home  is 
ever  heard.  Protests  against  the  old  obligations  of 
filial  piety,  complaints  of  the  growing  weight  of  the 
family  yoke,  are  sometimes  uttered ;  but  the  domes 
tic  cult  is  never  spoken  of  lightly.  As  for  the  com 
munal  and  other  public  forms  of  Shint5,  the  vigour 
of  the  old  religion  is  sufficiently  indicated  by  the 
continually  increasing  number  of  temples.  In  1897 
there  were  191,962  Shinto  temples;  in  1901  there 
were  195,256. 

It  seems  probable  that  such  changes  as  must  occur 
in  the  near  future  will  be  social  rather  than  religious  ; 
and  there  is  little  reason  to  believe  that  these  changes 
—  however  they  may  tend  to  weaken  filial  piety  in 
sundry  directions  —  will  seriously  affect  the  ancestor- 
cult  itself.  The  weight  of  the  family-bond,  aggra 
vated  by  the  increasing  difficulty  and  cost  of  life, 
may  be  more  and  more  lightened  for  the  individ 
ual  ;  but  no  legislation  can  abolish  the  senti 
ment  of  duty  to  the  dead.  When  that  sentiment 
utterly  fails,  the  heart  of  a  nation  will  have  ceased 
to  beat.  Belief  in  the  old  gods,  as  gods,  may  slowly 
pass ;  but  Shinto  may  live  on  as  the  Religion  of  the 
Fatherland,  a  religion  of  heroes  and  patriots ;  and 
the  likelihood  of  such  future  modification  is  indicated 
by  the  memorial  character  of  many  new  temples. 


REFLECTIONS  515 

—  It  has  been  much  asserted  of  late  years  (chiefly 
because  of  the  profound  impression  made  by  Mr. 
Percival  Lowell's  Soul  of  the  Far  East]  that 
Japan  is  desperately  in  need  of  a  Gospel  of  Indi 
vidualism  ;  and  many  pious  persons  assume  that 
the  conversion  of  the  country  to  Christianity  would 
suffice  to  produce  the  Individualism.  This  assump 
tion  has  nothing  to  rest  on  except  the  old  supersti 
tion  that  national  customs  and  habits  and  modes  of 
feeling,  slowly  shaped  in  the  course  of  thousands  of 
years,  can  be  suddenly  transformed  by  a  mere  act 
of  faith.  Those  further  dissolutions  of  the  old 
order  which  would  render  possible,  under  normal 
conditions,  a  higher  social  energy,  can  be  safely 
brought  about  through  industrialism  only,  — 
through  the  working  of  necessities  that  enforce 
competitive  enterprise  and  commercial  expansion. 
A  long  peace  will  be  required  for  such  healthy 
transformation ;  and  it  is  not  impossible  that  an 
independent  and  progressive  Japan  would  then 
consider  questions  of  religious  change  from  the 
standpoint  of  political  expediency.  Observation  and 
study  abroad  may  have  unduly  impressed  Japanese 
statesmen  with  the  half-truth  so  forcibly  uttered 
by  Michelet,  —  that  "money  has  a  religion,"  — 
that  "  capital  is  Protestant,"  —  that  the  power  and 
wealth  and  intellectual  energy  of  the  world  belong 
to  the  races  who  cast  off  the  yoke  of  Rome,  and 
freed  themselves  from  the  creed  of  the  Middle 


516  REFLECTIONS 

Ages.1  A  Japanese  statesman  is  said  to  have  lately 
declared  that  his  countrymen  were  "  rapidly  drifting 
towards  Christianity  "  !  Newspaper  reports  of  emi 
nent  utterances  are  not  often  trustworthy ;  but  the 
report  in  this  case  is  probably  accurate,  and  the 
utterance  intended  to  suggest  possibilities.  Since 
the  declaration  of  the  Anglo-Japanese  alliance,  there 
has  been  a  remarkable  softening  in  the  attitude  of 
safe  conservatism  which  the  government  formerly 
maintained  toward  Western  religion.  .  .  .  But  as 
for  the  question  whether  the  Japanese  nation  will  ever 
adopt  an  alien  creed  under  official  encouragement,  I 
think  that  the  sociological  answer  is  evident.  Any 
understanding  of  the  fundamental  structure  of  society 
should  make  equally  obvious  the  imprudence  of  at 
tempting  hasty  transformations,  and  the  impossibility 
of  effecting  them.  For  the  present,  at  least,  the 
religious  question  in  Japan  is  a  question  of  social 
integrity ;  and  any  efforts  to  precipitate  the  natural 
course  of  change  can  result  only  in  provoking  reaction 
and  disorder.  I  believe  that  the  time  is  far  away  at 
which  Japan  can  venture  to  abandon  the  policy  of 

1  No  inferences  can  be  safely  drawn  from  the  apparent  attitude  of  the  govern 
ment  towards  religious  bodies  in  Japan.  Of  late  years  the  seeming  policy  has  been 
to  encourage  the  less  tolerant  forms  of  Western  religion.  In  curious  contrast  to 
this  attitude  is  the  non-toleration  of  Freemasonry.  Strictly  speaking,  Freemasonry 
is  not  allowed  in  Japan  —  although,  since  the  abolition  of  exterritoriality,  the  foreign 
lodges  at  the  open  ports  have  been  permitted  (or  rather,  suffered)  to  exist  upon  certain 
conditions.  A  Japanese  in  Europe  or  America  is  free  to  become  a  Mason  ;  but  hn 
cannot  become  a  Mason  in  Japan,  where  the  proceedings  of  all  societies  must  remain 
open  to  official  surveillance. 


REFLECTIONS  517 

caution  that  has  served  her  so  well.  I  believe  that 
the  day  on  which  she  adopts  a  Western  creed,  her 
immemorial  dynasty  is  doomed ;  and  I  cannot  help 
fearing  that  whenever  she  yields  to  foreign  capital 
the  right  to  hold  so  much  as  one  rood  of  her  soil, 
she  signs  away  her  birthright  beyond  hope  of  re 
covery. 

* 
*  * 

With  a  few  general  remarks  upon  the  religion  of 
the  Far  East,  in  its  relation  to  Occidental  aggres 
sions,  this  attempt  at  interpretation  may  fitly  con 
clude. 

—  All  the  societies  of  the  Far  East  are  founded, 
like  that  of  Japan,  upon  ancestor-worship.  This 
ancient  religion,  in  various  forms,  represents  their 
moral  experience ;  and  it  offers  everywhere  to  the 
introduction  of  Christianity,  as  now  intolerantly 
preached,  obstacles  of  the  most  serious  kind.  At 
tacks  upon  it  must  seem,  to  those  whose  lives  are 
directed  by  it,  the  greatest  of  outrages  and  the  most 
unpardonable  of  crimes.  A  religion  for  which  every 
member  of  a  community  believes  it  his  duty  to  die 
at  call,  is  a  religion  for  which  he  will  fight.  His 
patience  with  attacks  upon  it  will  depend  upon  the 
degree  of  his  intelligence  and  the  nature  of  his 
training.  All  the  races  of  the  Far  East  have  not 
the  intelligence  of  the  Japanese,  nor  have  they  been 
equally  well  trained,  under  ages  of  military  disci 
pline,  to  adapt  their  conduct  to  circumstances.  For 


5i8  REFLECTIONS 

the  Chinese  peasant,  in  especial,  attacks  upon  his 
religion  are  intolerable.  His  cult  remains  the  most 
precious  of  his  possessions,  and  his  supreme  guide 
in  all  matters  of  social  right  and  wrong.  The  East 
has  been  tolerant  of  all  creeds  which  do  not  assault 
the  foundations  of  its  societies;  and  if  Western  mis 
sions  had  been  wise  enough  to  leave  those  foun 
dations  alone,  —  to  deal  with  the  ancestor-cult  as 
Buddhism  did,  and  to  show  the  same  spirit  of 
tolerance  in  other  directions,  —  the  introduction 
of  Christianity  upon  a  very  extensive  scale  should 
have  proved  a  matter  of  no  difficulty.  That  the 
result  would  have  been  a  Christianity  differing  con 
siderably  from  Western  Christianity  is  obvious, — 
the  structure  of  Far-Eastern  society  not  admitting 
of  sudden  transformations;  —  but  the  essentials  of 
doctrine  might  have  been  widely  propagated,  with 
out  exciting  social  antagonism,  much  less  race-hatred. 
To-day  it  is  probably  impossible  to  undo  what  the 
sterile  labour  of  intolerance  has  already  done.  The 
hatred  of  Western  religion  in  China  and  adjacent 
countries  is  undoubtedly  due  to  the  needless  and 
implacable  attacks  which  have  been  made  upon  the 
ancestor-cult.  To  demand  of  a  Chinese  or  an 
Annamese  that  he  cast  away  or  destroy  his  ances 
tral  tablets  is  not  less  irrational  and  inhuman  than 
it  would  be  to  demand  of  an  Englishman  or  a 
Frenchman  that  he  destroy  his  mother's  tomb 
stone  in  proof  of  his  devotion  to  Christianity. 


REFLECTIONS  519 

Nay,  it  is  much  more  inhuman,  —  for  the  Euro 
pean  attaches  to  the  funeral  monument  no  such 
idea  of  sacredness  as  that  which  attaches,  in  Eastern 
belief,  to  the  simple  tablet  inscribed  with  the  name 
of  the  dead  parent.  From  old  time  these  attacks 
upon  the  domestic  faith  of  docile  and  peaceful  com 
munities  have  provoked  massacres  ;  and,  if  persisted 
in,  they  will  continue  to  provoke  massacres  while 
the  people  have  strength  left  to  strike.  How  for 
eign  religious  aggression  is  answered  by  native  reli 
gious  aggression  ;  and  how  Christian  military  power 
avenges  the  foreign  victims  with  tenfold  slaughter 
and  strong  robbery,  need  not  here  be  recorded.  It 
has  not  been  in  these  years  only  that  ancestor-wor 
shipping  peoples  have  been  slaughtered,  impover 
ished,  or  subjugated  in  revenge  for  the  uprisings 
that  missionary  intolerance  provokes.  But  while 
Western  trade  and  commerce  directly  gain  by  these 
revenges,  Western  public  opinion  will  suffer  no  dis 
cussion  of  the  right  of  provocation  or  the  justice  of 
retaliation.  The  less  tolerant  religious  bodies  call  it  a 
wickedness  even  to  raise  the  question  of  moral  right ; 
and  against  the  impartial  observer,  who  dares  to  lift 
his  voice  in  protest,  fanaticism  turns  as  ferociously 
as  if  he  were  proved  an  enemy  of  the  human  race. 

From  the  sociological  point  of  view  the  whole 
missionary  system,  irrespective  of  sect  and  creed, 
represents  the  skirmishing-force  of  Western  civiliza 
tion  in  its  general  attack  upon  all  civilizations  of  the 


520  REFLECTIONS 

ancient  type,  —  the  first  line  in  the  forward  move 
ment  of  the  strongest  and  most  highly  evolved 
societies  upon  the  weaker  and  less  evolved.  The 
conscious  work  of  these  fighters  is  that  of  preachers 
and  teachers ;  their  unconscious  work  is  that  of 
sappers  and  destroyers.  The  subjugation  of  weak 
races  has  been  aided  by  their  work  to  a  degree 
little  imagined ;  and  by  no  other  conceivable  means 
could  it  have  been  accomplished  so  quickly  and  so 
surely.  For  destruction  they  labour  unknowingly, 
•ike  a  force  of  nature.  Yet  Christianity  does  not 
appreciably  expand.  They  perish ;  and  they  really 
lay  down  their  lives,  with  more  than  the  courage  of 
soldiers,  not,  as  they  hope,  to  assist  the  spread  of 
that  doctrine  which  the  East  must  still  of  necessity 
refuse,  but  to  help  industrial  enterprise  and  Occi 
dental  aggrandizement.  The  real  and  avowed  object 
of  missions  is  defeated  by  persistent  indifference  to 
sociological  truths  ;  and  the  martyrdoms  and  sacri 
fices  are  utilized  by  Christian  nations  for  ends 
essentially  opposed  to  the  spirit  of  Christianity. 

Needless  to  say  that  the  aggressions  of  race  upon 
race  are  fully  in  accord  with  the  universal  law  of 
struggle,  —  that  perpetual  struggle  in  which  only  the 
more  capable  survive.  Inferior  races  must  become 
subservient  to  higher  races,  or  disappear  before  them  ; 
and  ancient  types  of  civilization,  too  rigid  for  prog 
ress,  must  yield  to  the  pressure  of  more  efficient  and 


REFLECTIONS  521 

more  complex  civilizations.  The  law  is  pitiless  and 
plain  :  its  operations  may  be  mercifully  modified,  but 
never  prevented,  by  humane  consideration. 

Yet  for  no  generous  thinker  can  the  ethical  ques 
tions  involved  be  thus  easily  settled.  We  are  not 
justified  in  holding  that  the  inevitable  is  morally 
ordained,  —  much  less  that,  because  the  higher  races 
happen  to  be  on  the  winning  side  in  the  world- 
struggle,  might  can  ever  constitute  right.  Human 
progress  has  been  achieved  by  denying  the  law  of 
the  stronger, —  by  battling  against  those  impulses 
to  crush  the  weak,  to  prey  upon  the  helpless,  which 
rule  in  the  world  of  the  brute,  and  are  no  less  in 
accord  with  the  natural  order  than  are  the  courses  of 
the  stars.  All  virtues  and  restraints  making  civili 
zation  possible  have  been  developed  in  the  teeth  of 
natural  law.  Those  races  which  lead  are  the  races 
who  first  learned  that  the  highest  power  is  acquired 
by  the  exercise  of  forbearance,  and  that  liberty  is 
best  maintained  by  the  protection  of  the  weak,  and 
by  the  strong  repression  of  injustice.  Unless  we 
be  ready  to  deny  the  whole  of  the  moral  experience 
thus  gained,  —  unless  we  are  willing  to  assert  that  the 
religion  in  which  it  has  been  expressed  is  only  the 
creed  of  a  particular  civilization,  and  not  a  religion 
of  humanity,  —  it  were  difficult  to  imagine  any  ethi 
cal  justification  for  the  aggressions  made  upon  alien 
peoples  in  the  name  of  Christianity  and  enlighten 
ment.  Certainly  the  results  in  China  of  such  aggres- 


522  REFLECTIONS 

sion  have  not  been  Christianity  nor  enlightenment, 
but  revolts,  massacres,  detestable  cruelties,  —  the 
destruction  of  cities,  the  devastation  of  provinces, 
the  loss  of  tens  of  thousands  of  lives,  the  extortion 
of  hundreds  of  millions  of  money.  If  all  this  be 
right,  then  might  is  right  indeed ;  and  our  pro 
fessed  religion  of  humanity  and  justice  is  proved  to 
be  as  exclusive  as  any  primitive  cult,  and  intended 
to  regulate  conduct  only  as  between  members  of  the 
same  society. 

But  to  the  evolutionist,  at  least,  the  matter  ap 
pears  in  a  very  different  light.  The  plain  teaching 
of  sociology  is  that  the  higher  races  cannot  with 
impunity  cast  aside  their  moral  experience  in  dealing 
with  feebler  races,  and  that  Western  civilization  will 
have  to  pay,  sooner  or  later,  the  full  penalty  of  its 
deeds  of  oppression.  Nations  that,  while  refusing 
to  endure  religious  intolerance  at  home,  steadily 
maintain  religious  intolerance  abroad,  must  eventu 
ally  lose  those  rights  of  intellectual  freedom  which 
cost  so  many  centuries  of  atrocious  struggle  to  win. 
Perhaps  the  period  of  the  penalty  is  not  very  far 
away.  With  the  return  of  all  Europe  to  militant 
conditions,  there  has  set  in  a  vast  ecclesiastical 
revival  of  which  the  menace  to  human  liberty  is 
unmistakable  ;  the  spirit  of  the  Middle  Ages  threat 
ens  to  prevail  again  ;  and  anti-semitism  has  actually 
become  a  factor  in  the  politics  of  three  Continental 
powers.  .  .  . 


REFLECTIONS  523 

—  It  has  been  well  said  that  no  man  can  estimate 
the  force  of  a  religious  conviction  until  he  has  tried 
to  oppose  it.  Probably  no  man  can  imagine  the 
wicked  side  of  convention  upon  the  subject  of 
missions  until  the  masked  batteries  of  its  malevolence 
have  been  trained  against  him.  Yet  the  question  of 
mission-policy  cannot  be  answered  either  by  secret 
slander  or  by  public  abuse  of  the  person  raising  it. 
To-day  it  has  become  a  question  that  concerns  the 
peace  of  the  world,  the  future  of  commerce,  and  the 
interests  of  civilization.  The  integrity  of  China 
depends  upon  it ;  and  the  present  war  is  not  foreign 
to  it.  Perhaps  this  book,  in  spite  of  many  short 
comings,  will  not  fail  to  convince  some  thoughtful 
persons  that  the  constitution  of  Far-Eastern  society 
presents  insuperable  obstacles  to  the  propaganda  of 
Western  religion,  as  hitherto  conducted ;  that  these 
obstacles  now  demand,  more  than  at  any  previous 
epoch,  the  most  careful  and  humane  consideration  ; 
and  that  the  further  needless  maintenance  of  an 
uncompromising  attitude  towards  them  can  result 
in  nothing  but  evil.  Whatever  the  religion  of 
ancestors  may  have  been  thousands  of  years  ago, 
to-day  throughout  the  Far  East  it  is  the  religion  of 
family  affection  and  duty ;  and  by  inhumanly  ignor 
ing  this  fact,  Western  zealots  can  scarcely  fail  to 
provoke  a  few  more  "  Boxer  "  uprisings.  The  real 
power  to  force  upon  the  world  a  peril  from  China 
(now  that  the  chance  seems  lost  for  Russia)  should 


524  REFLECTIONS 

not  be  suffered  to  rest  with  those  who  demand  reli 
gious  tolerance  for  the  purpose  of  preaching  intoler 
ance.  Never  will  the  East  turn  Christian  while 
dogmatism  requires  the  convert  to  deny  his  ancient 
obligation  to  the  family,  the  community,  and  the 
government,  —  and  further  insists  that  he  prove  his 
zeal  for  an  alien  creed  by  destroying  the  tablets  of 
his  ancestors,  and  outraging  the  memory  of  those 
who  gave  him  life. 


Appendix 


Appendix 

HERBERT   SPENCER'S   ADVICE   TO  JAPAN 

SOME  five  years  ago  I  was  told  by  an  American  professor,  then 
residing  in  Tokyo,  that  after  Herbert  Spencer's  death  there  would 
be  published  a  letter  of  advice,  which  the  philosopher  had  addressed 
to  a  Japanese  statesman,  concerning  the  policy  by  which  the  Em 
pire  might  be  able  to  preserve  its  independence.  I  was  not  able  to 
obtain  any  further  information  ;  but  I  felt  tolerably  sure,  remember 
ing  the  statement  regarding  Japanese  social  disintegration  in  "  First 
Principles"  (§  178),  that  the  advice  would  prove  to  have  been  of 
the  most  conservative  kind.  As  a  matter  of  fact  it  was  even  more 
conservative  than  I  had  imagined. 

Herbert  Spencer  died  on  the  morning  of  December  8th,  1903 
(while  this  book  was  in  course  of  preparation)  ;  and  the  letter, 
addressed  to  Baron  Kaneko  Kentaro,  under  circumstances  with 
which  the  public  have  already  been  made  familiar,  was  published 
in  the  London  Times  of  January  i8th,  1904. 

FAIRFIELD,  PEWSEY,  WILTS, 
Aug.  26,  1892. 

MY  DEAR  SIR, — Your  proposal  to  send  translations  of  my  two 
letters l  to  Count  Ito,  the  newly-appointed  Prime  Minister,  is  quite 
satisfactory.  I  very  willingly  give  my  assent. 

Respecting  the  further  questions  you  ask,  let  me,  in  the  first 
place,  answer  generally  that  the  Japanese  policy  should,  I  think,  be 
that  of  keeping  Americans  and  Europeans  as  much  as  possible  at 
arm's  length.  In  presence  of  the  more  powerful  races  your  posi 
tion  is  one  of  chronic  danger,  and  you  should  take  every  precaution 
to  give  as  little  foothold  as  possible  to  foreigners. 

1  These  letters  have  not  as  yet  been  made  public. 
2M  529 


530  APPENDIX 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  only  forms  of  intercourse  which  you  may 
with  advantage  permit  are  chose  which  are  indispensable  for  the 
exchange  of  commodities  —  importation  and  exportation  of  physical 
and  mental  products.  No  further  privileges  should  K  allowed  to 
people  of  other  races,  and  especially  to  people  of  the  more  powerful 
races,  than  is  absolutely  needful  for  the  achievement  of  these  ends. 
Apparently  you  are  proposing  by  revision  of  the  treaty  with  the 
Powers  of  Europe  and  America  "to  open  the  whole  Empire  to 
foreigners  and  foreign  capital."  I  regret  this  as  a  fatal  policy.  If 
you  wish  to  see  what  is  likely  to  happen,  study  the  history  of 
India.  Once  let  one  of  the  more  powerful  races  gain  a  point  d*  appui 
and  there  will  inevitably  in  course  of  time  grow  up  an  aggres 
sive  policy  which  will  lead  to  collisions  with  the  Japanese  ;  these 
collisions  will  be  represented  as  attacks  by  the  Japanese  which  must 
be  avenged,  as  the  case  may  bj  ;  a  portion  of  territory  will  be 
seized  and  required  to  be  made  over  as  a  foreign  settlement ;  and 
from  this  there  will  grow  eventually  subjugation  of  the  entire  Japan 
ese  Empire.  I  believe  that  you  will  have  great  difficulty  in  avoid 
ing  this  fate  in  any  case,  but  you  will  make  the  process  easy  if  you 
allow  of  any  privileges  to  foreigners  beyond  those  which  I  have 
indicated. 

In  pursuance  of  the  advice  thus  generally  indicated,  I  should  say, 
in  answer  to  your  first  question,  that  there  should  be,  not  only  a 
prohibition  of  foreign  persons  to  hold  property  in  land,  but  also  a 
refusal  to  give  them  leases,  and  a  permission  only  to  reside  as 
annual  tenants. 

To  the  second  question  I  should  say  decidedly  prohibit  to 
foreigners  the  working  of  the  mines  owned  or  worked  by  Govern 
ment.  Here  there  would  be  obviously  liable  to  arise  grounds  of 
difference  between  the  Europeans  or  Americans  who  worked  them 
and  the  Government,  and  these  grounds  of  quarrel  would  be  followed 
by  invocations  to  the  English  or  American  Governments  or  other 
Powers  to  send  forces  to  insist  on  whatever  the  European  workers 
claimed,  for  always  the  habit  here  and  elsewhere  among  the  civilized 
peoples  is  to  believe  what  their  agents  or  sellers  abroad  represent  to 
them. 

In  the  third  place,  in  pursuance  of  the  policy  I  have  indicated, 
you  ought  also  to  keep  the  coasting  trade  in  your  own  hands  and 
forbid  foreigners  to  engage  in  it.  This  coasting  trade  is  clearly  not 
included  in  the  requirement  I  have  indicated  as  the  sole  one  to  be 
recognized  —  a  requirement  to  facilitate  exportation  and  importation 


APPENDIX  531 

of  commodities.  The  distribution  of  commodities  brought  to  Japan 
from  other  places  may  be  properly  left  to  the  Japanese  themselves, 
and  should  be  denied  to  foreigners,  for  the  reason  that  again  the 
various  transactions  involved  would  become  so  many  doors  open  to 
quarrels  and  resulting  aggressions. 

To  your  remaining  question  respecting  the  intermarriage  of  for 
eigners  and  Japanese,  which  you  say  is  "  now  very  much  agitated 
among  our  scholars  and  politicians "  and  which  you  say  is  "  one  of 
the  most  difficult  problems,"  my  reply  is  that,  as  rationally  answered, 
there  is  no  difficulty  at  all.  It  should  be  positively  forbidden.  It 
is  not  at  root  a  question  of  social  philosophy.  It  is  at  root  a  ques 
tion  of  biology.  There  is  abundant  proof,  alike  furnished  by  the 
intermarriages  of  human  races  and  by  the  interbreeding  of  animals, 
that  when  the  varieties  mingled  diverge  beyond  a  certain  slight 
degree  the  result  is  inevitably  a  bad  one  in  the  long  run.  I  have 
myself  been  in  the  habit  of  looking  at  the  evidence  bearing  on  this 
matter  for  many  years  past,  and  my  conviction  is  based  on  numer 
ous  facts  derived  from  numerous  sources.  This  conviction  I  have 
within  the  last  half-hour  verified,  for  I  happen  to  be  staying  in  the 
country  with  a  gentleman  who  is  well  known  and  has  had  much 
experience  respecting  the  interbreeding  of  cattle  ;  and  he  has  just, 
on  inquiry,  fully  confirmed  my  belief  that  when,  say  of  the  different 
varieties  of  sheep,  there  is  an  interbreeding  of  those  which  are  widely 
unlike,  the  result,  especially  in  the  second  generation,  is  a  bad  one 
—  there  arise  an  incalculable  mixture  of  traits,  and  what  may  be 
called  a  chaotic  constitution.  And  the  same  thing  happens  among 
human  beings  —  the  Eurasians  in  India,  the  half-breeds  in  America, 
show  this.  The  physiological  basis  of  this  experience  appears  to 
be  that  any  one  variety  of  creature  in  course  of  many  generations 
acquires  a  certain  constitutional  adaptation  to  its  particular  form  of 
life,  and  every  other  variety  similarly  acquires  its  own  special  adapta 
tion.  The  consequence  is  that,  if  you  mix  the  constitution  of  two 
widely  divergent  varieties  which  have  severally  become  adapted  to 
widely  divergent  modes  of  life,  you  get  a  constitution  which  is 
adapted  to  the  mode  of  life  of  neither  —  a  constitution  which  will 
not  work  properly,  because  it  is  not  fitted  for  any  set  of  conditions 
whatever.  By  all  means,  therefore,  peremptorily  interdict  marriages 
of  Japanese  with  foreigners. 

I  have  for  the  reasons  indicated  entirely  approved  of  the  regula 
tions  which  have  been  established  in  America  for  restraining  the 
Chinese  immigration,  and  had  I  the  power  I  would  restrict  them 


532  APPENDIX 

to  the  smallest  possible  amount,  my  reasons  for  this  decision  being 
that  one  of  two  things  must  happen.  If  the  Chinese  are  allowed 
to  settle  extensively  in  America,  they  must  either,  if  they  remain 
unmixed,  form  a  subject  race  standing  in  the  position,  if  not  of 
slaves,  yet  of  a  class  approaching  to  slaves  ;  or  if  they  mix  they 
must  form  a  bad  hybrid.  In  either  case,  supposing  the  immigra 
tion  to  be  large,  immense  social  mischief  must  arise,  and  eventually 
social  disorganization.  The  same  thing  will  happen  if  there  should 
be  any  considerable  mixture  of  European  or  American  races  with 
the  Japanese. 

You  see,  therefore,  that  my  advice  is  strongly  conservative  in  all 
directions,  and  I  end  by  saying  as  I  began  —  keep  other  races  at 
arm*  s  length  as  much  as  possible. 

I  give  this  advice  in  confidence.  I  wish  that  it  should  not  tran 
spire  publicly,  at  any  rate  during  my  life,  for  I  do  not  desire  to 
rouse  the  animosity  of  my  fellow-countrymen. 

I  am  sincerely  yours,  HERBERT  SPENCER. 

P.S.  —  Of  course,  when  I  say  I  wish  this  advice  to  be  in  confi 
dence,  I  do  not  interdict  the  communication  of  it  to  Count  Ito,  but 
rather  wish  that  he  should  have  the  opportunity  of  taking  it  into 
consideration. 

How  fairly  Herbert  Spencer  understood  the  prejudices  of  his 
countrymen  has  been  shown  by  the  comments  of  the  Times  upon 
this  letter,  —  comments  chiefly  characterized  by  that  unreasoning 
quality  of  abuse  with  which  the  English  conventional  mind  com 
monly  resents  the  pain  of  a  new  idea  opposed  to  immediate  interests. 
Yet  some  knowledge  of  the  real  facts  in  the  case  should  serve  to 
convince  even  the  Times  that  if  Japan  is  able  in  this  moment  to 
fight  for  the  cause  of  civilization  in  general,  and  for  English  inter 
ests  in  particular,  it  is  precisely  because  the  Japanese  statesmen  of  a 
wiser  generation  maintained  a  sound  conservative  policy  upon  the 
very  lines  indicated  in  that  letter  —  so  unjustly  called  a  proof  of 
"colossal  egotism.'* 

Whether  the  advice  itself  directly  served  at  any  time  to  influ 
ence  government  policy,  I  do  not  know.  But  that  it  fully  accorded 
with  the  national  instinct  of  self-preservation,  is  shown  by  the  his- 


APPENDIX  533 

tory  of  that  fierce  opposition  which  the  advocates  of  the  abolition 
of  extra-territoriality  had  to  encounter,  and  by  the  nature  of  the 
precautionary  legislation  enacted  in  regard  to  those  very  matters 
dwelt  upon  in  Herbert  Spencer's  letter.  Though  extra-territori 
ality  has  been  (unavoidably,  perhaps)  abolished,  foreign  capital 
has  not  been  left  free  to  exploit  the  resources  of  the  country  ;  and 
foreigners  are  not  allowed  to  own  land.  Though  marriages  be 
tween  Japanese  and  foreigners  have  never  been  forbidden,1  they 
have  never  been  encouraged,  and  can  take  place  only  under  special 
legal  restrictions.  If  foreigners  could  have  acquired,  through  mar 
riage,  the  right  to  hold  Japanese  real  estate,  a  considerable  amount 
of  such  estate  would  soon  have  passed  into  alien  hands.  But  the 
law  has  wisely  provided  that  the  Japanese  woman  marrying  a  for 
eigner  thereby  becomes  a  foreigner,  and  that  the  children  by  such 
a  marriage  remain  foreigners.  On  the  other  hand,  any  foreigner 
adopted  by  marriage  into  a  Japanese  family  becomes  a  Japanese  ; 
and  the  children  in  such  event  remain  Japanese.  But  they  also 
remain  under  certain  disabilities  :  they  are  precluded  from  holding 
high  offices  of  state  ;  and  they  cannot  even  become  officers  of  the 
army  or  navy  except  by  special  permission.  (This  permission 
appears  to  have  been  accorded  in  one  or  two  cases. )  Finally,  it 
is  to  be  observed  that  Japan  has  kept  her  coasting-trade  in  her  own 
hands. 

On  the  whole,  then,  it  may  be  said  that  Japanese  policy  followed, 
to  a  considerable  extent,  the  course  suggested  in  Herbert  Spencer's 
letter  of  advice  ;  and  it  is  much  to  be  regretted,  in  my  humble 
opinion,  that  the  advice  could  not  have  been  followed  more  closely. 
Could  the  philosopher  have  lived  to  hear  of  the  recent  Japanese 
victories,  —  the  defeat  of  a  powerful  Russian  fleet  without  the  loss 
of  a  single  Japanese  vessel,  and  the  rout  of  thirty  thousand  Russian 
troops  on  the  Yalu,  —  I  do  not  think  that  he  would  have  changed 
his  counsel  by  a  hair's-breadth.  Perhaps  he  would  have  commended, 

1  The  number  of  families  in  Toky5  representing  such  unions  is  said  to  be  over 
one  hundred. 


534  APPENDIX 

so  far  as  his  humanitarian  conscience  permitted,  the  thoroughness 
of  the  Japanese  study  of  the  new  science  of  war  :  he  might  have 
praised  the  high  courage  displayed,  and  the  triumph  of  the  ancient 
discipline  ;  —  his  sympathies  would  have  been  on  the  side  of  the 
country  compelled  to  choose  between  the  necessities  of  inviting  a 
protectorate  or  fighting  Russia.  But  had  he  been  questioned  again 
as  to  the  policy  of  the  future,  in  case  of  victory,  he  would  probably 
have  reminded  the  questioner  that  military  efficiency  is  a  very  different 
thing  from  industrial  power,  and  have  vigorously  repeated  his  warning. 
Understanding  the  structure  and  the  history  of  Japanese  society,  he 
could  clearly  perceive  the  dangers  of  foreign  contact,  and  the  direc 
tions  from  which  attempts  to  take  advantage  of  the  industrial  weakness 
of  the  country  were  likely  to  be  made.  ...  In  another  generation 
Japan  will  be  able,  without  peril,  to  abandon  much  of  her  conserva 
tism  ;  but,  for  the  time  being,  her  conservatism  is  her  salvation. 


Bibliographical   Notes 

—  IN  the  preparation  of  this  essay,  I  have  been  much  indebted  to 
the  Transactions  of  the  Asiatic  Society  of  Japan,  and  especially  to 
the  following  contributions :  — 

(ON  THE  SUBJECT  OF  SHINTO) 

"The  Revival  of  Pure  Shinto,"  by  Sir  Ernest  Satow, — Ap 
pendix  to  Vol.  III. 

"  The  Shinto  Temples  of  Ise,"  by  Satow,  —  Vol.  II. 
"Ancient  Japanese  Rituals,"  by  Satow,  —  Vols.  VII  and  IX. 
"Japanese  Funeral  Rites,"  by  A.  H.  Lay,  — Vol.  XIX. 

(ON  THE  SUBJECT  OF  LAW  AND  CUSTOM) 

"Notes  on  Land  Tenure  and  Local  Institutions  in  Old  Japan," 
by  Dr.  D.  B.  Simmons.  Edited  by  Professor  J.  H.  Wigmore, 

—  Vol.  XIX. 

"  Materials  for  the  Study  of  Private  Law  in  Old  Japan,"  by 
Professor  J.  H.  Wigmore,  —  Vol.  XX,  Supplements  I,  2,  3,  5. 

(ON  THE  CHRISTIAN  EPISODE  OF  THE  SIXTEENTH  AND  SEVENTEENTH 
CENTURIES) 

"The  Church  at  Yamaguchi  from  1550  to   1586,"  by  Satow, 

—  Vol.  VII. 

"  Review  of  the  Introduction  of  Christianity  into  China  and 
Japan,"  by  J.  H.  Gubbins,  —  Vol.  VI. 

"  Historical  Notes  on  Nagasaki,"  by  W.  A.  Wooley,  —  Vol.  IX. 
"The  Arima  Rebellion,"  by  Dr.  Gecrtz,  —  Vol.  IX. 

535 


536  BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTES 

(ON  JAPANESE  HISTORY  AND  SOCIOLOGY) 

"  Early  Japanese  History,"  by  W.  G.  Aston,  — Vol.  XVI. 
"  The  Feudal  System  of  Japan  under  the  Tokugawa  Shoguns," 
byj.  H.  Gubbins,  —  Vol.  XV. 

—  The  extracts  quoted  from  "The  Legacy  of  lyeyasu  "  have 
been  taken  from  the  translation  made  by  J.  F.  Lowder. 

—  I  regret  not  having  been  able,  in  preparing  this  essay,  to  avail 
myself  of  the  very  remarkable  "  History  of  Japan  during  the  Century 
of  Early  Foreign  Intercourse  (1542-1651),"   —  by  James  Murdoch 
and  Isoh  Yamagata,  —  which  was  published  at  Kobe  last  winter. 
This  important  work   contains   much  documentary  material  never 
before  printed,  and  throws  new  light  upon  the  religious  history  of 
the  period.      The  authors  are  inclined  to  believe  that,  allowing  for 
numerous  apostasies,  the  total  number  of  Christians  in  Japan  at  no, 
time  much  exceeded  300,000  ;  and  the  reasons  given  for  this  opinion, 
if  not  conclusive,  are  at  least  very  strong.      Perhaps  the  most  inter 
esting  chapters  are  those  dealing  with  the  Machiavellian  policy  of 
Hideyoshi  in  his  attitude  to  the  foreign  religion  and  its  preachers ;  but 
there  are  few  dull  pages  in  the  book.      Help  to  a  correct  understand 
ing  of  the  history  of  the  time  is  furnished  by  an  excellent  set  of  maps, 
showing  the  distribution  of  the  great  fiefs  and  the  political  partition 
of  the  country  before  and  after  the  establishment  of  the  Tokugawa 
Shogunate.      Not  the  least  merit  of  the  work  is  its  absolute  freedom 
from  religious  bias  of  any  sort. 


INDEX 


Ability,  slight  opportunity  for,  to  rise, 
448-449. 

Adams,  Will,  278,  343;  interviewed  by 
lyeyasu,  344-346 ;  favoured  by  the 
Emperor,  346-347 ;  quoted  concern 
ing  Hideyori's  intrigues  and  fate, 

352-353- 

Adoption,  custom  of,  in  patriarchal 
family,  69,  74-75;  marriage  signi 
fied  merely,  74;  modern  practices 
regarding,  422. 

Adultery,  enactments  of  lyeyasu  re 
garding,  377-378. 

Affection,  limitations  placed  on,  79  ff. 

Age  of  the  Gods,  period  called  the,  285. 

Agnosticism,  Buddhism  is  not,  235, 242. 

Agriculture,  gods  of,  140,  169-170;  no 
degradation  attached  to  pursuit  of, 
269. 

Akindo,  the  commercial  class,  270-271. 
See  Commerce. 

Alcestis,  the  Japanese  woman  might 
be  compared  to,  398. 

Ancestors,  imperial,  worship  of  the, 
122-137,  305-306. 

Ancestor-worship,  introduction  to  reli 
gion  of,  27-38 ;  the  real  religion  of 
Japan,  27  ;  summary  of  three  forms 
of,  27-28;  the  family-cult  of,  28-30; 
characteristics  of  earliest,  30  ff. ; 
stability  of,  in  Japan  for  two  thou 
sand  years,  38  ;  summary  of  beliefs 
surviving  from,  37;  three  stages 
of,  41-42 ;  evolution  of  permanent 
form  from  funeral-rites,  42-59 ;  char 
acteristics  of  religion  of,  to-day,  59- 
6l ;  bearing  of,  on  family-organiza 
tion,  65  ff. ;  marriage  under  the 
religion  of,  79-84;  the  develop 
ments  of,  121  ff. ;  four  classes  of, 
to-day,  137-138 ;  accommodation 


of  Buddhism  to,  203-204;  tolera 
tion  of  ancient  European,  by  Roman 
Catholicism,  211 ;  Buddhist  theory 
of  rebirths  reconciled  to,  213  n.; 
Confucian  system  founded  on,  207- 
208,  320;  needless  attacks  on,  ac 
count  for  smallness  of  results  of 
modern  missions,  369, 517-519 ;  pro 
tection  of,  by  modern  laws,  422-423 ; 
obstacles  presented  to  Christianity 

by,  517-519- 

Ancient  Japanese  Rituals,  51  n.  Set 
Satow. 

Animals,  absence  of  cruelty  to,  16-17 ; 
kindness  to,  taught  by  Buddhism, 
216-217. 

Animism,  development  of,  145-146. 

Antigone,  comparison  of  the  Japanese 
woman  to,  398. 

Apes,  images  of  Koshin's  symbolic,  220. 

Apprentices,  obligation  of,  to  avenge 
masters,  321 ;  past  and  present 
position  of,  444. 

Architecture  displayed  in  Buddhist 
temples,  219-220. 

Arima,  lord  of  Shimabara,  354,  355. 

Army,  birth  of  modern,  410;  pay  of 
officers  in,  450  n. 

Art,  knowledge  of  Japanese  religion 
necessary  to  understanding  of,  4-5 ; 
introduced  by  Buddhism,  217-218, 
224,  503;  forms  of,  in  Buddhist 
temples,  218-219;  expulsion  oi 
Jesuits  a  fortunate  thing  for,  371- 
372;  causes  which  tended  to  pro 
duction  of  a  multitude  of  objects  of, 
388;  effect  of  modern  industrial 
conditions  on,  493. 

Artizans,  gods  of,  138-139;  clans  of, 
259 ;  position  of,  under  quasi-feudal 
system,  269-270;  organizations  of, 
see  Guilds. 


2M 


537 


INDEX 


Arts,  developed  in  Japan  under  Buddh 
ist  teaching,  208;  progress  of  the, 
under  lyeyasu,  305. 

Asada,  Lieutenant,  suicide  of  widow 
of,  317. 

Asceticism,  Shinto,  165-166. 

Ashikaga  shogunate,  297-299.  See 
under  lyeyasu. 

Aston,  W.  G.,  translation  of  the  Nihongi 
by,  cited, 46, 47, 126  n.,  167  n.,  182  n., 
216  n.,  256  n.,  258  n.,  392  n. ;  Early 
Japanese  History  by,  cited,  285  n. 

Authority,  deference  of,  to  collective 
opinion,  435-438;  exercise  of  offi 
cial,  on  the  individual,  447-454, 468- 
470. 

Bambetsu,  "Foreign  Branch,"  the 
mass  of  the  people,  259-260. 

Banishment,  punishment  by,  108-111.. 

Banner-supporters  (hatamoto),  267. 

Bateren,  Roman  Catholic  priests,  341  n. 

Bato-Kwannon,  images  of,  220. 

Behaviour,  sumptuary  regulations  as 
to,  191-194 ;  proclamation  of  Sho- 
toku  Taishi  regarding,  391-392. 

Births,  regulations  as  to  presents  on 
occasions  of,  183 ;  registration  of, 
by  Buddhist  priests,  223-224. 

Black,  an  Englishman,  as  a  Japanese 
story-teller,  14-15. 

Bon-odori,  dances  of  the  festival  of  the 
dead,  222. 

Boundaries,  gods  of,  144. 

Bow,  etiquette  of  the,  192. 

Boys,  conduct  of,  regulated  by  the 
community,  101-102;  proverb  re 
garding  mischievousness  of,  461. 

Buddhism,  Japanese  name  for  (But- 
sudo) ,  27 ;  mortuary  tablets  of,  50- 
51,  221 ;  the  dead  according  to,  55 ; 
reconcilement  of,  and  Shinto,  55- 
56;  entry  of,  into  Japan,  203-205; 
disestablishment  of  (1871) ,  205, 408 ; 
charm  of,  to  Western  thinkers,  231- 
232;  summary  of  teachings  of,  233- 
250;  influence  of,  under  Emperor 
Temmu,  263;  obstacles  to  estab 
lishment  of  religious  hierarchy  by, 
275 ;  military  development  of,  295- 


296;  violent  end  to  militant,  301- 
302;  Jesuitism  mistaken  for  a  new 
kind  of,  362-364;  no  essential  of 
Shinto  weakened  by,  413-414. 

Buddhism  in  Translations,  H.  C.  War 
ren's,  231. 

Buke,  the  military  class,  265. 

Butsudan,  household-shrine,  50. 

Butsudo,  "  The  Way  of  the  Buddha," 

c 

Capital,  danger  to  Japan  from  foreign, 

509-510,  517. 
Carpenters,  religious  rites  performed 

by,  139 ;  organizations  of,  441-442. 
Cassola,  Francisco,  357  n. 
Castes,  division  of  society  into,  260. 
Cauldron  and  saucepan,  god  of  the, 

143- 

Celibacy,  forbidden  by  early  religion, 
68 ;  condemned  by  code  of  lye 
yasu,  381. 

Charms  to  protect  houses,  163  n. 

Chastisement,  punishment  by,  107- 
108,  461. 

Chiara,  Giuseppe,  357  n. 

Chieftainships,  hereditary,  259. 

Children,  food  offered  to  the  dead 
might  not  be  eaten  by,  61  n. ;  posi 
tion  of,  in  patriarchal  system,  80-82 ; 
placing  of,  under  protection  of 
gods,  97;  as  priestesses,  159;  duty 
of  vengeance  performed  by,  321 ; 
training  of,  in  schools,  461-465; 
misery  of  modern  factory-life  of, 

494- 

China,  date  of  introduction  of  spirit- 
tablet  from,  30;  religion  of  filial 
piety  in,  57-58;  belief  as  to  the 
Demon-Gate  imported  from,  144; 
penal  codes  imported  from,  194; 
arts  and  learning  of,  taught  by 
Buddhism,  223;  civilization  of, 
brought  to  Japan  by  Buddhism, 
225;  harakiri  perhaps  introduced 
from,  314;  Jesuit  policy  in,  361, 
367;  cause  for  hatred  of  Western 
religion  in,  518 ;  integrity  of,  de 
pends  on  mission-policy,  523-524, 

Chori,  pariahs,  271-274. 


INDEX 


539 


Chosku,  clan  of,  401,  402,  406,  408. 

"  Chronicles  of  Nihon."    See  Nihongi. 

Christianity,  assumption  that  indi 
vidualism  would  be  produced  by, 
515;  obstacles  to,  presented  by 
religion  of  ancestor-worship,  517- 
519.  See  Jesuits  and  Missions. 

Chu-U,  the  condition  of,  213  n. 

Circle  of  Perpetual  Hunger  for  wicked 
ghosts,  211. 

Clan,  cult  of  the,  93-95. 

Clans,  number  of,  in  ancient  Japan, 
95 ;  three  great  classes  of,  259-260 ; 
early  society  an  aggregation  of, 
262-264,  276-277 ;  wars  between 
the  military,  for  supremacy,  293  ff. ; 
misery  one  result  of  break-up  of, 
489-491. 

Cleanliness  exacted  by  Shinto,  161- 
162. 

Coffins,  size  of,  regulated  by  law,  197. 

Colour-prints,  production  of,  389. 

Commerce,  contempt  for,  270;  Portu 
guese,  a  help  to  Jesuit  missionary 
work,  364-365 ;  rise  of,  to  power, 
488 ;  dangers  resulting  from  rise 
of,  489-494- 

Communism  not  a  modern  growth, 
279. 

Competition,  undesirability  of,  452- 
454;  Government  aid  to  national 
industrial,  493-494. 

Concubines,  under  patriarchal  system, 
68,  78-79,  84;  remarks  of  lyeyasu 
regarding,  78,  380. 

Confucianism,  influence  of,  in  Japan, 
207-208,  320  ff. 

Conscience,  doctrine  of,  admitted  by 
Buddhism,  216. 

Cooking-range,  god  of  the,  143,  169. 

Cost  of  living,  increase  in,  450-452. 

Coulanges,  Fustel  de,  60,  290,  491 ; 
quoted,  33,  77. 

Courtesy,  legal  regulation  of,  191-194. 

Craft-gods,  138-139,  169-170. 

Crafts,  effect  of  Buddhism  on,  208; 
guilds  connected  with,  270,  276, 440- 

443- 
Crucifixion  of  Christians  at  Nagasaki, 

337- 


Cruelty  to  animals,  apparent  absence 
of,  16-17;  punishment  of,  after 
death,  217. 

D 

Daimiates,  under  Tokugawa  shogun- 
ate,  265-266,  275;  reorganization 
of,  by  lyeyasu,  304;  abolition  of, 
410. 

Daimyo,  lords  of  provinces,  266;  con 
version  of,  to  Jesuitism,  334 ;  Jesuits 
work  with  aid  of,  334,  336,  338,  369 ; 
protection  of  peasantry  against,  434. 

Dai-Nihon-Shi,  compilation  of,  404. 

Dances,  sacred,  158-159 ;  of  the  festival 
of  the  dead,  222. 

Dancing,  Japanese,  222  n.  2. 

Dan-no-ura,  sea-fight  of,  293. 

Daughter,  gradation  of  terms  signify 
ing,  189. 

Daughters,  sale  of,  82,  85  n. 

Daughters-in-law,  customs  as  to,  74-75. 

Dead,  early  conceptions  of  fate  of,  31- 
34;  rites  in  honour  of,  42-54; 
poems  in  praise  of,  43 ;  Buddhist 
doctrine  of,  55 ;  effect  of  Buddhism 
on  worship  of,  211-212. 

Death,  penalty  of,  inflicted  for  slight 
offences,  196-197;  matters  relating 
to,  regulated  by  law,  197. 

Debtors,  reduction  of,  to  slavery,  258. 

Deities,  punishments  by  tutelar,  114- 
117;  lesser  Shinto,  122.  See  Gods 
and  Ujigami. 

Demeanour,  regulation  of,  191-194; 
cultivation  of,  as  an  art,  391-393. 

Demon-Gate,  the,  144. 

Dependants,  under  patriarchal  system, 
86-88,  255-258 ;  conservative  atti 
tude  of,  438 ;  position  of  employes 
in  commercial  houses,  444;  position 
of  maid-servants,  445-447. 

Deportment,  code  of,  191. 

Deshima,  Dutch  factory  at,  359. 

Discipline,  strength  of,  in  Old  Japan, 
177-200. 

Divination,  systems  of,  166-168;  not 
used  in  warfare,  168. 

Divorce,  in  ancient  family  system,  68, 
79-80,  83,  85 ;  the  new  laws  about, 
422. 


540 


INDEX 


Dolls,  rules  governing  presents  of,  185. 

Dominicans  in  Japan,  338;  reckless 
zeal  of,  368. 

Drama,  introduced  by  Buddhism,  224; 
the  age  of  popular,  389 ;  incidents 
of  real  tragedy  reproduced  in,  318- 

319. 

Dress,  restrictions  as  to,  184-186. 
Dutch,  assistance  of,  in  putting  down 

Shimabara  Revolt,  356-357;   effect 

on  status  of,  of  Shimabara  Revolt, 

359-360. 

Ear-Monument,  the,  303. 

Education,  effect  of  Buddhism  on, 
222-223;  introduction  of  modern 
system  of,  410;  of  the  State,  459- 
481 ;  the  sustaining  of,  by  personal 
sacrifices,  475-478 ;  of  students 
abroad,  479-481. 

Embroideries,  13. 

Emigration  from  Japan,  424. 

Emma  (  Yama),  judge  of  dead,  219. 

Emperor,  application  of  term,  to  early 
rulers,  incorrect,  261. 

Enactments  of  the  Kumi,  103-106. 

Eta  people,  the,  no,  271-274. 

Etiquette,  cultivation  of,  in  Tokugawa 
period,  391-393. 

Evolution,  Buddhism  a  theory  of,  232. 

Execution,  account  of  an  early,  195- 
196. 

Exports,  rise  in  value  of,  493. 

Expression,  etiquette  of,  191. 


Factory-life,  horrors  of  modern,  494. 

Families  of  the  nobility,  number  of, 
265. 

Family,  definition  of  Japanese  term, 
28 ;  basis  of  the  ancient,  65-67 ; 
obligation  to  perpetuate  the,  68-69  > 
constitution  of  the  patriarchal,  70-89. 

Family-cult,  first  stage  of  ancestor- 
worship,  28-38. 

Farmers,  the  rank  of,  268-269 ;  secured 
against  undue  oppression,  434-435. 
See  Agriculture. 

Father,  gradation  of  terms  signifying, 
189. 


Feast-days,  Shinto,  115,  153. 

Fencing,  Japanese,  an  example  of 
antipodal  action,  11-12. 

Festival  of  the  dead,  dances  of  the,  222. 

Festival-processions,  Shinto,  115. 

Festivals,  of  the  Ujigami,  96,  153,  156- 
158 ;  laws  as  to  presents  at  boys', 
183;  Shin-Sho-Sai,  269;  temple, 
96,  503- 

Feudalism,  Japanese  so-called,  254- 
262,  277. 

Filial  Piety,  religion  of,  56-59,  67,  503 ; 
marriage  a  chief  duty  of,  75;  doc 
trine  of,  reenforced  and  expanded 
by  Confucianism,  208. 

First  Principles.     See  Spencer. 

Fiske,  John,  quoted,  253. 

Flower-arrangement,  art  of,  390-391. 

Flower-daughter,  the,  74. 

Food,  use  of,  by  ghosts,  35-36;  offer 
ings  of,  to  the  dead,  35-36, 53 ; 
offerings  of,  to  gods,  51  n.,  154, 
156-157 ;  for  the  dead  might  not  be 
eaten  by  children,  61  n. ;  laws  as  to, 
at  weddings  and  funerals,  183; 
offerings  of,  to  Pretas,  211;  decree 
forbidding  use  of  flesh  for,  216; 
Buddhist  offerings  of,  221 ;  recent 
increase  in  price  of,  450  n. 

Formosa,  Ujigami  not  established  by 
Japanese  in,  424  n. 

"  Forty-seven  Ronin,"  story  of  the, 
323-325 ;  tombs  of  the,  325  n. 

Four  Deva  Kings,  the,  286;  temple  of, 

220. 

Franciscans   in   Japan,   337    ff.,  368; 

lyeyasu    takes    measures    against, 

348-349. 

Freedmen,  class  of,  257,  258-259. 
Freemasonry  in  Japan,  516  n. 
Fujiwara  clan,   rise  of  the,   286-287; 

duration  of  rule  of,  286,  292,  307; 

final  degeneration  of,  292-293. 
Funeral-rites,  ancient,  42-54. 
Funerals,  laws  as  to  food  at,  183  ;  laws 

governing,  197. 


Gaki,  evil  gods,  211,  212. 
Gardeners,  guild  of,  442-443. 


INDEX 


Gardening,  first  development  of,  under 
Buddhism,  208  ;  modern,  442. 

Gardens,  holiness  of,  170. 

Ghost-houses,  44,  66;  transformation 
of,  into  Shinto  temples,  72. 

Ghosts,  ancestor-worship  coeval  with 
belief  in,  30;  identified  in  early 
beliefs  with  gods,  31,  54-56,  65. 

Ghost-ships,  Buddhist,  222. 

Gifts.     See  Presents. 

Girl-priestesses  in  Shinto  temples,  158- 

159. 

Girls  in  service,  position  of,  445-447. 

Go,  definition  of,  74  n. 

Goblins  admitted  to  exist  by  Buddh 
ism,  2IO-2II. 

Go-Daigo,  Mikado,  revolt  of,  against 
Hojo,  296 ;  later  vicissitudes  of,  296- 
297. 

Gods,  no  early  difference  between 
ghosts  and,  31,  65 ;  development  of 
distinctions  between  greater  and 
lesser,  31-32 ;  early  conceptions  of, 
32-33;  Japanese  conception  of, 
compared  with  Greek  and  Roman, 
33-34;  the  dead  and,  54-56;  the 
minor,  122 ;  all  Japanese  consid 
ered  as,  in  one  sense,  132;  of 
crookedness,  132-133 ;  of  crafts  and 
callings,  138-139,  169-170;  number 
of  Shinto,  worshipped,  140-141 ;  of 
the  house,  143-144 ;  the  great  num 
ber  of,  149-150 ;  of  industry,  169- 
170;  identity  of  Shinto  and  Buddh 
ist,  210-211;  Buddhist  evil,  211- 
212. 

God-shelves,  138 ;  daily  prayers  be 
fore,  150-152 ;  religious  charms  on, 
163  n. 

Go-Kameyama,  Emperor,  298. 

Go-Komatsu,  Emperor,  298. 

Goshi,  yeomanry,  267. 

Go-Toba,  Emperor,  works  at  sword- 
making,  269. 

Go-Tsuchi-mikado,  Emperor,  299. 

Government,  identity  of,  with  religion, 
112-113. 

Graves,  legal  dimensions  of,  197 ;  white 
lanterns  at,  222. 

£reat  God  of  Izumo,  the,  134,  136. 


Greeks,  parallels  drawn  between  Japan 
ese  and,  19-20,  33-35, 42, 44,  67,  69, 
75.  77.  80,  88,  101,  in,  164,  187, 
222  n.,  253,  290,  485-486,  488. 

Gubbins,  J.  H.,  quoted,  335. 

Guilds,  270,  276 ;  religious  organiza 
tion  of,  138-139 ;  modern  workings 
of,  440-443. 

H 

Hachiman,  the  war  god,  95 ;  acknow 
ledgment  of,  in  Buddhism,  210. 

Hades,  development  of  belief  in,  31. 

Hair,  class  indicated  by  method  of 
wearing,  257. 

Harakiri,  custom  of,  313-315 ;  instance 
of,  in  Russian  war,  508  n. 

Harmony,  Japanese  sense  of,  in  tints 
and  colours,  12. 

Hearth,  gods  of  the,  169. 

Heavenly  sovereigns,  worship  of  the, 
122-123 1  maintained  through  years 
of  revolt,  305-306. 

Heimin,  "  common  folk,"  271. 

Hell,  according  to  Buddhism,  215. 

Hidetada,   Emperor,   son  of  Iy6yasu, 

353- 

Hideyori,  son  of  Hiddyoshi,  351-352. 

Hideyoshi,  career  of,  302-303 ;  attitude 
of,  toward  Jesuits,  336-337. 

Hierarchy,  character  of  the  Shinto,  98- 
99;  Shinto  mythological,  122-123; 
attempt  to  establish  a  Buddhist  re 
ligious,  275. 

Hinin,  a  wandering  pariah,  no;  "  not- 
human-beings,"  274. 

Hirado,  foreign  factories  at,  346,  356, 

359- 

Hirata,  great  Shinto  commentator,  33, 
403;  quoted,  55,  57,  66,  125,  131- 

133. 134-135. 136, 150-151. J6i,  !79; 

banishment  and  death  of,  406. 

History,  scientific  knowledge  of  Japan 
ese,  impossible,  3  ;  legendary,  285- 
286;  beginning  of  authentic,  286. 

Hitogaki,  the  "  human  hedge,"  46. 

Hitogata,  "  mankind-shapes,"  163-164. 

Hitotsubashi,  Shogun,  408. 

Hiyei-san,  monastery  buildings  burnt 
at,  301. 

Hizen,  clan  of,  406. 


542 


INDEX 


H5jo,  supremacy  of  the,  294;  defeat 
of  and  extinction,  296. 

Home,  gods  of  the,  143-144. 

Honesty,  Japanese,  17. 

Hongwanji,  Shin  sect  of,  301. 

Horyuji,  the  temple  called,  220. 

House,  building  of,  a  religious  act,  139, 
144-145  ;  gods  of  the,  143. 

Houses,  size  of,  prescribed  by  law, 
182-183,  184;  of  prostitution,  enact 
ment  of  lyeyasu  regarding,  379  n. ; 
operation  of  labour-unions  when 
building,  441-442. 

Human  hedge,  the,  46. 

Husband,  seven  terms  for,  189. 

Husbands,  position  of  adopted,  74-75. 

Huxley,  T.  H.,  quoted  concerning  in 
dustrial  reform,  494-495. 

I 

"  I,"  gradations  of  the  pronoun,  189. 
Ibuku  Mogusa,  extract  from,  335. 
Ihai, "  soul-commemoration,"  Buddhist 

mortuary  tablets,  50,  221. 
Illustration,    development    of    art    of, 

389- 

Images,  Buddhist,  503;  setting  up  of, 
220-22 i. 

Imperial  ancestors,  worship  of  the, 
122-123 1  duration  of,  305-306. 

Individual,  obligations  of  the,  under 
patriarchal  system,  loo-ni ;  rela 
tion  of,  to  the  Ujigami,  134-135 ; 
freedom  of,  did  not  exist,  176,  277- 
278;  modern  recognition  of,  410; 
now  free  in  theory,  in  practice  like 
his  forefathers,  420-423,  427-428; 
Government  official  authority  over 
the,  447-454. 

Individualism,  assumption  that  Chris 
tianity  would  produce,  515. 

Industries,  developed  in  Japan  under 
Buddhist  teaching,  208;  develop 
ment  of,  under  lyeyasu,  305. 

Industry,  gods  of,  138-139,  169-170. 

Irregularity,  the  aesthetic  value  of,  12. 

Ise,  shrines  of,  136,  137-138;  every 
Japanese  expected  to  visit,  137-138  ; 
worship  at  shrines  of,  154-155. 

Ishijima,  suicide  of  wife  of,  318. 


Isolation,  causes  for  policy  of,  359. 

Ito,  Marquis,  policy  of,  426. 

lyemochi,  Shogun,  408. 

lyeyasu,  Tukugawa,  apotheosis  of,  141 ; 
enactment  of,  concerning  rudeness, 
193;  influence  of  Confucianism 
over,  208;  powers  of  daimyo  re 
stricted  by,  266;  Will  Adams  cre 
ated  a  samurai  by,  278 ;  sketch  of 
career  of,  303-305 ;  Laws  of,  304 ;  de 
cree  of,  concerning  suicide,  313 ;  de 
cree  concerning  code  of  vengeance, 
321;  persecution  of  Christians  by, 
337-338.  SSo-SSS;  decree  dealing 
with  Jesuits,  341-342,  348;  inter 
views  of,  with  Will  Adams,  344-346 ; 
castle  of  Osaka  stormed  and  burnt 
by,  352 ;  Legacy  of,  78,  349, 377-383. 
392. 

Izanagi,  the  legend  concerning,  48, 
126-131. 

Izanami,  126-131. 

Izumo,  farming  forbidden  to  samurai 
in,  268-269. 

Izumo  temple,  the,  136;  worship  at, 
154-155.  158-159. 

J 

Japan  in  Days  of  Yore,  Dening's,  385  n. 

Jesuitism,  effect  of,  on  Japan,  358; 
causes  of  early  success  of,  360-367 ; 
policy  of,  in  China,  361,  367;  in 
ability  of,  to  adapt  itself  to  Jap 
anese  social  conditions,  371. 

Jesuits,  arrival  of,  in  Japan,  334;  fa 
voured  by  Nobunaga,  334-335 ;  per 
secutions  of,  337-338,  353-354;  par 
tial  expulsion  of,  351 ;  revolt  of 
peasantry  managed  by,  354-355 ; 
final  crushing  of,  357. 

Jigai,  method  of  suicide  for  women, 

SIS- 
Jimmu,    Emperor,    285;   offerings    at 

tomb  of,  45. 
Jingo,    Emperor,   legend    of   Korean 

conquest  by,  285. 
Jinrikisha-men,  code  of,  439-440. 
Jito,    Empress,   edict    of,    concerning 

slavery,  258  n. 
Jiujutsu,  465. 


INDEX 


543 


Jizo,  playmate  of  infant  ghosts,  219; 

first  production  of  icons  of,  220. 
Joyousness  of  existence,  Japanese,  16- 

17- 

Judges,  salaries  of,  450  n. 
Junshi,  voluntary  self-sacrifice,  47-48, 

312-313;    decree  of    lyeyasu  puts 

stop  to,  313-314- 

K 

Kamakura,  destruction  of,  296. 
Kami,  "  gods,"  33 ;  significance  of,  54- 

55;  devotion  to,  the  first  of  duties 

according  to  lyeyasu,  382. 
Kannushi,  office  of,  155-156. 
Karma,  metaphysics  of,  236,  237,  242, 

243,  244,  246. 
Kasuga,  the  deity  of,  95. 
Kataki-uchi,  custom  of,  322-323. 
Kishu,  Prince  of,  403. 
Kiyomasa,  Kato,  apotheosis  of,  141. 
Kobetsu,  imperial  families,  259. 
Kobodaishi,  205. 
Ko-ji-ki, "  Records  of  Ancient  Matters," 

124-125, 140, 145 ;  extract  from,  126- 

128. 
Korea,  Buddhism  brought  into  Japan 

from  (552  A.D.),  204;  Hideyoshi's 

war  against,  303. 

Koshin,  protector  of  highways,  220. 
Kotoku,  Emperor,  47,  291;    edict  of, 

concerning  slaves,  256  n. 
Ko-uji,  "  lesser  families,"  70,  254. 
Kublai  Khan,  invasion  by,  295. 
Kuge,  noble  families,  265. 
Kukai,  founder  of  Shingon  sect,  205. 
^f«wz-enactments,  103-106. 
A"awz'-system,  the,  103  n.,  186-187. 
Kuroda,  S.,  quoted,  236-237,  244. 
Kurumaya,  code  of  the,  439. 
Kwambaku,  "  regent,"  office  of,  estab 
lished,  288. 

Kwammu,  Emperor,  287-288. 
Kwannon,  Goddess  of  Mercy,  219. 


Labour-unions,  440-443.    See  Guilds. 
La  Cite  Antique,  de  Coulanges',  cited, 
33.  42,  77,  485.  491- 


Landscape-gardeners,  union  of,  442- 

443- 

Language,  impossibility  of  mastering, 
by  adult  Occidental,  13;  conven 
tional  organization  of,  188-190; 
rules  governing  use  of,  189-190. 

Lanterns  at  graves,  222. 

Latrina,  gods  of  the,  144. 

Law,  method  and  manner  of  adminis 
tration,  383-385. 

Laws,  sumptuary,  182-198. 

Laws  of  lyeyasu,  the,  304. 

Laws  of  Shotoku  Taishi,  376-377, 

Legacy  of  lyeyasu,  78,  349,  377-383. 
392. 

Libraries  under  Tokugawa  regime, 
389,  404. 

Literature,  qualifications  essential  for 
an  understanding  of  Japanese,  5-6 ; 
introduction  of  Chinese,  207-208; 
introduced  or  developed  by  Buddh 
ism,  224;  under  patronage  of 
lyeyasu,  305;  development  of,  in 
Tokugawa  period,  389;  the  party 
of,  404-406,  409-410. 

Lowell,  Percival,  15 ;  on  Japanese  con 
trariety,  ii ;  Soul  of  the  Far  East 
of,  189  n.,  515. 

Lustrations,  religious,  162-165. 

M 

Mabuchi,  Shinto  commentator,  177- 
178,  286,403. 

Maid-servants,  position  of,  445-447. 

Manners,  laws  as  to,  191-194. 

Marquez,  Pedro,  357  n. 

Marriage,  obligatory  in  ancient  Japan, 
68 ;  in  patriarchal  family,  68-70,  74- 
77;  signified  adoption  only,  74; 
a  chief  duty  of  filial  piety,  75 ;  cere* 
mony  of,  75-77 ;  of  servants,  87-88 ; 
modern  innovations  in,  421-422; 
service  by  girls  merely  a  prepara 
tion  for,  445-447. 

Masashige,  Kusunoki,  58. 

Masons,  Japanese  as,  516  n. 

Massacre  of  Shimabara,  355-357. 

Massacres,  of  priests  by  Nobunaga, 
275;  caused  by  Christian  attacks 
on  domestic  faiths,  519,  523. 


544 


INDEX 


"  Master     Cold-Rice,"     second     son 

called,  73. 

Master  of  Ponds,  the,  143-144. 
Matsuri-goto,    "  matters   of   worship," 

38. 

Matsuri,  temple-festivals,  96. 
Meat,  forbidden  for  food,  216-217 1  f°r" 

bidden  as  offerings  by  Buddhism, 

221. 

Merchants,  place  of,  in  social  ranking, 

270;    modern    rise    of,    to    power, 

488. 
Metempsychosis,   no    doctrine    of,   in 

Shinto,  65  ff.,  209-210. 
Mikado,  God  of  the  Living,  136-137; 

usurpation  of  powers  of,  286-292. 
Miko,  girl-priestesses,  158-159. 
Afimidzuka,  "  Ear-Monument,"  303. 
Minamoto,  regency  of  the,  293-294. 
Mionoseki,  FJa  settlement  at,  273. 
Miracle-plays    performed    by  Jesuits, 

364- 
Missions,  Christian,  causes    of   small 

results    of    modern,  369,  517-520; 

consideration   of  work  of  foreign, 

520-522 ;  importance  of  policy  of,  in 

Far  East,  523-524.     See  Jesuits. 
Mitama-San-no-tana,  "  shelf  of  the  au 
gust  spirits,"  50. 

Mitama-shiro,  "  spirit-substitutes,"  50. 
Mitamaya,    "  august  -  spirit  -  dwelling," 

So. 
Mitford,  translation  of  Shorei-Hikki  by, 

quoted,  76 ;    Tales  of  Old  Japan  by, 

271-272,  323. 

Mitsukuni,  Prince  of  Mito,  404. 
Miya,  "  august  house,"  44,  50  n. 
Money,  first  appearance  of,  489. 
Monism,  higher  Buddhism  a  species 

of,  232,  242-246. 

Mother,  nine  terms  signifying,  189. 
Motowori,  Shinto  commentator,  403 ; 

quoted,  34,  167-168,  178,  179. 
Mourning  customs,  ancient,  43-47. 
Mourning-houses,  44;  Shinto  temples 

evolve  from,  49. 

Moxa,  use  of.  in  punishment,  461. 
Mythology,  of  the  reigning  house,  124- 

133;    summary    of   the    Japanese, 

129-130. 


N 

Nakatomi,  noble  family  of,  265. 
Nara,  Ear-Monument  at,  303. 
Nature,  controlled  by  ghosts  of  ances* 

tors,    according    to    Shint5,    118; 

Buddhist    interpretation    of,    212- 

214. 

Navy,  organization  of  modern,  410. 
Nihongi,  "Chronicles  of  Nihon,"  124- 

125,  129-130,    140;    cited,    46,    47, 

126  n.,  167  n.,  182  n.,  216  n.,  256  n, 

258  n.,  392  n. 
Nirvana    not    preached    to    common 

Japanese  people,  209,  214-215. 
Nobility,  origin  of  the,  265-266.    See 

Daimyo. 
Nobunaga,  Odo,  massacres  of  priests 

by,  275 ;  career  of,  300-302  ;  Jesuits 

favoured  by,  334-335. 
Nomi-no-Sukune,  46. 
"  Notes  on  Land  Tenure  and  Local 

Institutions  in  Old  Japan,"  J.  H. 

Wigmore's,     cited,    103-106,    185, 

353  n. 

O 
Obedience,   rules    of,  56-59,  73,    175 

(see  Filial  Piety) ;  modern  reversion 

to  law  of,  73, 411-412 ;  of  individual 

to  the  community,  loi-m. 
Obeisances,  countless  grades  of,  191. 
Offerings,  to  dead,  45 ;  meat  forbidden 

as,  221. 

Officers,  army,  pay  of,  450. 
O-harai,  ceremony  of  purification,  160- 

163. 
Oho-kuni-nushi-no-Kami,     134,     136 ; 

Rough  and  Gentle  spirits  of,  140. 
Ojin,  Emperor,  95  ;    Korean  immigra 
tion  in  reign  of,  286. 
Osaka,  Temple  of  the  Four  Deva  Kings 

at,  220;    military  headquarters  of 

Shin  sect  at,  301 ;    lyeyasu   storms 

castle  of,  352. 
Ostracism,   the  punishment    by,   107- 

108 ;  student,  463-464. 
O-uji,  "  great  families,"  70-72,  254. 
Outcasts,  the  class  of,  no,  3*71-274. 
Outlines  of  Cosmic   Philosophy,  John 

Fiske's,  cited,  253. 


INDEX 


545 


Outlines  of  the  Mah&y&na  Philosophy, 

Kuroda's,  236-237,  244. 
Owari,  Prince  of,  403. 


Painting,  effect  of  Buddhism  on,  208 ; 
examples  of,  in  temples,  218-219. 

Panama  railroad,  debt  of,  to  religion 
of  filial  piety,  58. 

Papacy,  interference  of,  in  Jesuit  mis 
sionary  system,  367-368. 

Parents,  rights  of,  in  patriarchal  sys 
tem,  80-82. 

Pariahs,  class  of,  no,  271-274. 

Parliament,  convocation  of  first,  410. 

Peasants,  revolt  of,  354-355;  security 
of,  against  oppression,  433-434; 
in  the  quasi-feudal  system,  268-269. 
See  Farmers. 

Perry,  Commodore,  advent  of,  407. 

Poems  in  praise  of  dead,  43. 

Poetry,  contests  in,  during  Tokugawa 
period,  390. 

Police,  pay  of,  450. 

Politeness  as  an  art,  391-393. 

Politics,  modern  Japanese,  425,  454. 

Pollution,  death  regarded  as,  48-49. 

Polygyny  in  ancient  society,  77-79. 

Population,  alien  elements  in,  20-21. 

Porcelains,  Japanese,  13,  388-389. 

Poverty  resulting  from  modern  indus 
trial  revolution,  488-493. 

Prayers,  prescribed  by  Hirata,  150; 
daily,  150-153. 

Presents,  sumptuary  laws  concerning, 
183-186. 

Pretas,  wicked  ghosts,  211. 

Priests,  Shinto,  office  and  powers  of, 
98-99,  113-117,  155-156;  Buddhist, 
as  teachers,  222-223;  ranked  with 
the  samurai,  271 ;  massacres  of,  in 
sixteenth  century,  275 ;  Buddhist,  as 
warriors,  295,  301-302.  See  Jesuits. 

Printing,  first  development  of,  under 
Buddhism,  208. 

Privacy,  lack  of,  in  Japan  ancient  and 
modern,  112. 

Professions  under  divine  patronage, 
169-170, 

Professors,  salaries  of,  450  n. 


Pronouns,  rules  as  to  use  of,  189. 

Property,  laws  of  succession  to,  in  Old 
Japan, 82-83. 

Prostitution,  houses  of,  379  n. 

Psychology,  difference  between  East 
ern  and  Western,  13. 

Punishment  of  school-children,  461-462. 

Punishments,  severity  of,  under  ancient 
system,  106-108,  194-195 ;  by  com 
munities,  106-111 ;  by  tutelar  deities, 
114-117 ;  laws  as  to,  194-197. 

Purification,  ceremonies  of,  160-165; 
by  ascetic  practices,  165-166. 


Rebirth,  doctrine  of,  inconsistent  with 
early  Japanese  beliefs,  65;  the 
Buddhist  idea  of,  and  ancestor- 
worship,  213  n. 

"  Records  of  Ancient  Matters,"  the 
(Ko-ji-ki)t  124. 

Reform,  agitation  for  industrial,  494- 
496. 

Regency,  growth  of  the,  288-290 ;  usur 
pation  of  power  by  the,  290-293. 

Regent,  office  of,  established,  288. 

Registrars,  Buddhist  priests  become 
public,  223-224. 

Relationship,  gradation  of  nouns  in 
dicating,  189. 

Religion,  summary  of  three  forms  of, 
Shinto,  27-28 ;  of  filial  piety,  56-59, 
67, 75,  208,  503 ;  the  basis  of  organi 
zation  of  patriarchal  family,  67,  74; 
marriage  a  rite  of,  75-77;  identity 
of  government  with,  112-113;  meta 
physics  of  Buddhist,  229-250 ;  origin 
in,  of  customs  of  the  vendetta,  323 ; 
tolerance  of,  by  lyeyasu  (except 
Roman  Catholicism),  381-382;  the 
life  of  the  Japanese  people,  507- 
508;  obstacles  to  propagation  of 
Western,  in  Far  East,  523.  See  An 
cestor-worship  and  Missions. 

Rents,  modern  increase  in,  450  n. 

Responsibility  from  above  downward, 

433-438. 

"  Review  of  the  Introduction  of  Chris 
tianity  into  China  and  Japan,"  quo 
tation  from,  335. 


54^ 


INDEX 


Rerolution,    modern    industrial,  487- 

491 ;  dangers  of  a  social,  490-493. 
Rice,  divination  by,  167,  168. 
Rice-pot,  goddess  of  the,  144. 
Riddle    of  the     Universe,    Haeckel's, 

cited,  243. 
Roads,  under  protection  of  Buddhist 

deities,  144. 
Romans,    ancient,    parallels    between 

Japanese  and,  33-35,  42,  44.  67.  75. 

77,  80,  88,  in,   164,   187,  253,  258, 
290,  485-486,  488. 

Rudeness,     Japanese     definition     of, 

193- 

Russia,  the  war  with,  506-509. 

Ryobu  defined,  205  n. 

Ry5bu-Shinto,  establishment  of,  205- 
206. 

S 

Sacrifices,  history  of  all  religious, 
traceable  to  offerings  to  ghosts,  36; 
ancient  funeral,  45-48 ;  origin  of 
human,  312;  of  one's  family,  318- 
319.  See  Junshi. 

Salaries  of  officials,  450  n. 

Samurai,  class  of  the,  267,  275;  obli 
gation  of,  to  perform  harakiri,  315 ; 
suppression  of,  410. 

Sandals,  laws  about,  184. 

Saris,  Captain,  account  by,  of  an  exe 
cution,  195-196;  quoted,  348. 

Satow,  Sir  Ernest,   quoted,  51  n.,  57, 

78,  140  n.,  157-158,  178-179,  342  n., 

363- 

Satsuma,  clan  of,  401,  402, 406. 
Scarecrows,  god  of,  144,  151,  169. 
Scholarship,  advance  of,  in  Tokugawa 

period,  403-404. 
School,  training  of  children   in,  461- 

465. 

Schools,  connected  with  Buddhist  tem 
ples,  223 ;  Government,  464-465. 

Sculpture,  developed  in  Japan  under 
Buddhist  teaching,  208 ;  displayed 
in  roadside  images,  220,  503. 

Sekigahara,  battle  of,  304. 

Self-control,  legal  enforcement  of,  191- 
192. 

Seppuku,   Chinese  term  for  harakiri, 


Servants,  in  Old  Japan,  86-88;  con 
servative  attitude  of,  438;  position 
of  maid,  445-447.  See  Apprentices 
and  Dependants. 

"  Shadow-Shogun,"  the,  294;  deposi 
tion  of,  295. 

Shelf  of  the  august  spirits,  50. 

Shimabara  Revolt,  the,  354-355. 

Shimonoseki,  bombardment  of,  408. 

Shin,  sect  of,  defeated  by  Nobunaga, 
301-302. 

Shinbetsu,  "  divine  branch  "  of  families, 

259- 

Shinobigoto,  43. 

Shin-Sho-Sai,  the  Ninth  Festival,  269. 

Shinto,  signification,  27  ;  forms  of  wor 
ship,  27-28  ;  the  morals  of,  112-113 ; 
relation  of  Japanese  mythology  to. 
summarized,  129-150;  origin  of 
gods  of  the  house  in,  143-144; 
greater  gods  of,  acknowledged  by- 
Buddhism,  210 ;  restoration  of,  408 ; 
no  essential  of  weakened  by  Buddh 
ism,  413-414.  See  Ancestor-wor 
ship. 

Shogun,  authority  of  the,  265,  275-276; 
significance  of  term,  293 ;  extension 
of  power  of,  293-294. 

Shogunate,  beginning  of  history  of, 
293  ;  abolition  of,  408. 

Shorei-Hikki,  "  Record  of  Ceremonies," 
76. 

Shoryobune,  "  ghost-ships,"  222. 

Shrines,    worship    at,     135-137,    154- 

155- 

Sickness,  charms  against,  163-164. 

Simmons,  Dr.  D.  B.,  181,  257. 

Sisters  of  Charity,  comparison  of  Jap 
anese  women  to,  398. 

Slavery,  origin  of,  257-258. 

Slaves,  condition  of,  under  patriarchal 
system,  255-256;  partial  emancipa 
tion  of,  256-257 ;  factory-operatives 
regarded  as,  494. 

Smile,  rules  and  regulations  about  thet 
191-192. 

Socialism  not  a  modern  growth,  279, 

Societies,  secret,  516  n. 

Society,  organization  of  Old  Japanese, 
253-282. 


INDEX 


547 


Sociology,  difficulties  in  studying  Jap 
anese,  3-4. 

Soga  brothers,  the,  apotheosis  of,  141. 

Sohodo-no-kami,  god  of  scarecrows, 
144,  151,  169. 

Son,  eleven  graded  terms  signifying, 
189. 

Sons-in-law,  significant  motto  concern 
ing,  74 ;  customs  as  to,  74-75. 

"  Soul  of  Old  Japan,"  the,  177. 

Soul  of  the  Far  East,  Lowell's,  189  n., 

SiS- 
Speech,  non-existence  of  freedom  of, 

188  ;  regulation  of  forms  of,  189-190. 
Spencer,  Herbert,  29,  30,  78  n.  2,  121, 

189  n.,  232,  306,  412;    quoted,  32, 
69  n.,  98  n.,  199-200,  234-235,  237- 
238,  239-240,  241,  245,  311. 

Spirits,  Rough  and  Gentle,  140. 

Spirit-sticks,  50,  51. 

Story-teller,  an  Englishman  who  is  a 
professional  Japanese,  14-15. 

Strangulation,  suicide  by,  314. 

Student-revolts,  significance  and  re 
sults  of,  436-437. 

Students,  private  means  furnished  for 
education  of,  475-478;  education 
of,  abroad,  479-481.  See  Education. 

Subsidies,  Government,  to  industries, 

493- 
Succession,  laws  of,  in  Old  Japan,  82- 

83- 

Sugiwara-no-Michizan6,  spirit  of,  141. 

Suicide,  by  the  sword,  47-48 ;  customs 
as  to,  314-318 ;  modern  instances 
of  female,  317 ;  instance  of,  in 
Russian  war,  508  n.  See  Harakiri 
and  Junshi. 

Suiko,  Empress,  286,  287. 

Suinin,  Emperor,  abolishes  the  "hu 
man  hedge,"  46. 

Sun,  daily  greeting  to  the,  151-152. 

Sun-goddess,  worship  of,  123-124,  130- 
J33.  135-136;  acknowledged  by 
Buddhism,  210;  offering  of  first- 
fruits  to,  by  Emperor,  269  n. 

Surgeons,  efficiency  of  Japanese,  481. 

Sword-making  most  sacred  of  crafts, 
139,  170,  269-270. 

ijwords,  wearing  of,  prohibited,  410. 


Tablets,  mortuary,  50-51;  Buddhist 
mortuary  (thai),  221. 

Tadasuk6,  Ooka,  quoted,  385  n. 

Taira,  rise  and  fall  of  the,  292-293. 

Taishi,  Shotoku,  proclamation  of,  re 
garding  politeness,  391-392. 

Takatoki,  sacrificial  suicide  by  the 
sword  originated  by,  47. 

Takayama,  a  Japanese  Jesuit,  351. 

Take-no-uji-no-Sukune,  apotheosis  of, 
141. 

Tales  of  Old  Japan,  Mitford's,  271, 323. 

Tattooing  of  slaves,  256. 

Tea-ceremonies  in  Tokugawa  period, 
390-391. 

Teachers,  Buddhist  priests  as,  222-223  • 
duties  to,  same  as  to  fathers,  322 ; 
salaries  of,  450  n. ;  relation  of,  to 
pupils,  462;  transformation  stages 
in  attitude  of  pupils  toward,  471- 

473- 

Temmu,  Emperor,  decree  of,  forbid 
ding  use  of  meat,  216 ;  reorganiza 
tion  of  castes  by,  260 ;  reign  of,  263. 

Temple  of  the  Four  Deva  Kings  at 
Osaka,  220. 

Temple-festivals,  96,  503. 

Temples,  Shinto,  evolved  from  mourn 
ing-houses,  49 ;  Shinto  parish,  dedi 
cated  to  Uji-gods  (Ujigami), 95-98; 
Shinto,  of  the  first  grade,  135 ; 
Shinto,  classification  of,  137 ;  propi 
tiatory,  142-143;  forms  of  art  in 
Buddhist,  218-219;  notable  ex 
amples  of,  220;  schools  connected 
with,  223 ;  Buddhist,  burned  by 
Jesuits,  336,  338 ;  Shinto,  in  For 
mosa,  424  n.;  number  of  Shinto,  at 
present,  514;  memorial  character 
of  new,  514. 

Tenjin,  worship  of,  141. 

Terakoya,  drama  of,  319  n. 

Thieves  sentenced  to  slavery,  258. 

"  Thou,"  the  use  of,  189. 

Togo,  Vice-Admiral,  reply  of,  to  Impe 
rial  message,  507  n. 

Tokugawa,  shogunate  of,  Japanese  civ 
ilization  reaches  limit  of  develop 
ment  under,  375.  See  lyeyasu. 


INDEX 


Tokyo,  widespread  poverty  in,  result 
ing  from  industrial  revolution,  488. 

Tools,  surprising  shapes  of,  n  ;  sacred- 
ness  of,  169. 

Tosa,  clan  of,  406. 

Toshogu,  lyeyasu  worshipped  under 
name  of,  141. 

Trade,  mean  rank  of  those  engaged  in, 
270.  See  Commerce. 

Tragedy,  Japanese,  founded  on  fact, 
318-319- 

Uji,  the  ancient  family  called,  70. 

Ujigami,  original  relation  of  commu 
nity  to,  93-94;  as  clan-deities,  94- 
96;  offences  against,  100;  relation 
of  the  individual  to,  134-135 ;  festi 
vals  of  the,  153,  156-158 ;  cults  of, 
maintained,  and  not  supplanted,  by 
Buddhism,  413. 

Uji-no-kami,  "  the  god  of  the  uj'i," 
72. 

Underworld,  development  of  belief  in, 

31- 

Uneme-no-Kami,  Takenaka,  354. 
University,  students  at  the,  465-466. 
Utensils,  domestic,  sacredness  of,  169; 

art  displayed  in,  389. 
Uyemon  no  Hyoge,  decree  concerning 

junshi  disobeyed  by,  313. 


Variety  to  be  found  in  Japanese  form 

of  civilization,  280-282. 
Vendetta,  religious  origin  for  customs 

of,  323- 
Vengeance,  the  duty  0^320-326;  lye- 

yasu's  decree  concerning  code  of, 

321. 
Verb,  etiquette  governing  uses  of  the, 

189-190. 

Vestals,  Japanese,  158-160. 
Vice,  lyeyasu  on  suppression  of,  378- 

379- 
Village-laws,  peasants',  433-434. 

W 

Wages  of  maid-servants,  446. 
"Wanderings    of    Cain,"   Coleridge's, 
136. 


War,  ten  centuries  of,  following  rise  oi 
military  power,  285-293;  against 
Korea,  303 ;  with  peasantry,  354- 
355 ;  with  Russia,  506-509. 

Warfare,  divination  in,  168. 

Warren,  Henry  Clarke,  quoted,  231. 

Way  of  the  Buddha,  the  (Butsudo), 
27. 

Way  of  the  Gods,  the  (Shinto),  27,  49. 

Weddings,  customs  as  to,  75-77  ;  laws 
as  to  food  at,  83 ;  presents  at,  183- 
185- 

Wells,  the  god  of,  143. 

Whipping,  infrequency  of  now,  as 
punishment,  461.  See  Punish 
ments. 

Wife,  gradation  of  terms  signifying, 
189. 

Wigmore,  J.  H.,  quoted,  98,  103-106, 
181,  185,  353  n.,  384. 

Wind-gods,  prayer  to  the,  157-158. 

Wine,  Buddhism  forbids  offerings  of, 
221. 

Wives,  position  of  adopted,  74. 

Woman,  tribute  paid  to  the  Japanese, 
393-398. 

Women,  mourning  rites  intrusted  to, 
51 ;  position  of,  in  old  Japanese 
family,  83-84;  as  priestesses,  159; 
forms  of  speech  for  use  of,  100; 
method  of  suicide  for,  315 ;  modern 
instances  of  suicide  by,  317,  318 ; 
duty  of  vengeance  performed  by, 
321 ;  considered  most  wonderful 
aesthetic  products  of  Japan,  393- 
398;  misery  of  modern  factory-life 
of,  494. 

Workmanship,  perfection  of  Japanese, 
12-13 I  under  modern  industrial 
conditions,  493-494. 

Worship,  three  forms  of  Shinto,  27-28 
(see  Ancestor-worship)  ;  of  Imperial 
ancestors,  122-123,  305-306;  of 
Sun-goddess,  123-124,  130-133, 
JSS-^6-  I5I~I52;  at  shrines,  135- 
137.  154;  propitiatory,  142-143; 
phallic,  146;  daily  rites  of,  150- 
153;  public  rites  of,  153-159;  of 
the  dead,  effect  of  Buddhism  on. 

2H-2I2. 


INDEX 


549 


Xavier,  arrival  of,  in  Japan,  334. 

Y 

Yanta,  judge  of  the  dead,  218-219. 
Yamaguchi,  land  granted  to  Jesuits  at, 

362-363. 
Yamato-damashi,   "  The   Soul    of  Ya- 

mato,"  177. 
Yedo,  obligatory  residence  of  daimyo 


in,  304;    Iy6yasu  the  founder  of, 

305- 

Yeizan,  Buddhist  high  priest,  383. 

Yekken,  Japanese  moralist,  316  n. 

Yeomanry,  early  Japanese,  267. 

Yoritomo,  founder  of  Minamoto  dy 
nasty,  295-296. 

"You"  and  "  thou,"  usages  as  to,  189. 

Yuriaku,  Emperor,  deaths  inflicted  by, 
for  rudeness,  194. 


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